Tilly's Trans Tuesdays

TRANS REPRESENTATION IN 2025 MEDIA part 4: TV part 3

Welcome to Trans Tuesday! This week we discuss the rest of the television I watched and look at the overall numbers and see if we can spot some trends, in TRANS REPRESENTATION IN 2025 MEDIA part 4: TV part 3!

If you really want the full picture from these four essays, please be sure to see PART 1: MOVIES, PART 2: TV PART 1, and PART 3: TV PART 2 first. At the end of this essay we’re gonna look at the totals from the entire year and see where things are at.

Fab, let’s get this wrapped up!

Resident Alien s4 – 2*
Nonbinary actor Jinkx Monsoon appears again (in this report), voicing a cgi gray alien named Bruce, who’s referred to with “he” pronouns. As the character is a literal alien we don’t really know if the “he” pronouns would correlate to the alien being a cis man in-world, but the show made the choice to cast a nonbinary actor to play a character that’s treated like they’re male, so I have to count this as actor rep, but not character rep… because this show has done nothing to make me think they’d include a transmasc alien that wasn’t intended to be a joke. I’ve said in past trans rep in media reports that I really like this show… but it’s also demonstrated some regressive ideas around gender on multiple occasions.

In ep 2 there’s a protracted joke about a cis woman who had sex with a cis man, and there’s questions about “who was inside who” and “of course she wasn’t inside him.” I think this is just another, “ha ha because women don’t have penises” joke, but y’know, some trans women do, so it’s still implicitly transphobic.

Also a cis guy later says, “I assure you I am all man, my penis is mostly intact” which just reinforces that dicks = men, but not all men have dicks, and not everyone who has a dick is a man. We are all more than our reproductive organs.

Harry, who was an alien that was made human, has an alien human hybrid son, constantly called a son and referred to with he/him pronouns, who is named Bridget. The baby alien puppet is voiced by a cis woman, and when the alien is in human form, is played by nonbinary actor Taylor Blackwell, and presents somewhat gender-neutral.

So the two options here are that Bridget the alien kid is nonbinary, or it’s a joke about how having a “son” with a girl’s name, voiced by a woman, with a gender-neutral appearance is “funny,” because Gender Reasons.

I’d like to give the show the benefit of the doubt, but based on its track record in past seasons I would have to lean more toward it being a joke. I won’t count it as a joke or as trans character representation in the tally, but my gut says, with this show, it was sadly meant as a joke.

Severance s2 -0
Still a show with a super trans premise that doesn’t at all get close to exploring transness within its world.

Slow Horses s5  – 0
In the season premiere, a cis woman insults a cis man, who wondered if any ladies were checking him out, by saying something like “please, your vibes are so asexual.” And it’s weird because the character’s definitely not asexual, and it’s not like nobody could find asexual people attractive? Boo. What the heck. This isn’t trans-related, but is a weird and terrible dig at asexual people for some reason.

In one episode, Lamb and his team are being babysat by people from MI5, and a cis woman is butting heads with him. He comes out of the bathroom and she’s standing there and he says, “I left the seat up for you.” Damn it, come on, that’s just transphobic bullshit.

Star Trek Strange New Worlds s3 – 0
There’s a brief gag where a cis man is in a blue suit with a big tie and flower crown at a wedding, and he says he was forced to be the maid of honor, and it felt very much like it was intended to be a joke, and y’know what, I don’t like that in my Star Trek.

One episode seemingly undoes the entire “genetics are not destiny” talk with La’an from the amazingly trans-affirming episode AD ASTRA PER ASPERA, which I did three essays about! It sort of flips the good on its head and says, “well actually, your genetics do determine who you are and have to be,” and that is… not great.

There’s an episode that features aliens called Metrons, who are kind of like sentient balls of light, and I have no idea if they have gender. They can take human form and appear fairly androgynous. The character was played by Dariush Zadeh, who I couldn’t find enough information about to confirm their gender, so I’m not counting the actor or the character.

Stranger Things s5 – 0
Will has a coming out scene, and though he’s gay and cis, it’s handled well and something a lot of trans people can probably relate to.

The Studio s1 – 0
In episode three someone says a cis man will, “laugh his tits off” and in the same episode women call cis men “pussy” and “bitch.” 

In another episode a woman gets mad and says, “blow me,” and in the same episode a studio executive says they have a meeting with the guy who wrote Harry Potter stage plays blehhh could we not.

In another episode a cis woman holds an open bottle of vodka at her crotch like a penis and jerks her hips so it splashes out the top (to… celebrate good news). Sure.

This show is fabulous and doesn’t need to resort to that kind of stuff, it’s just so ingrained into society, and comedy, that it shows up everywhere.

Survival of the Thickest s1 – 2
Trans woman Peppermint has a supporting role. There are likely other trans people in the club she works in, but there are many and they’re not really characters as much as they are background extras.

In one episode, trans actor Jayae Riley Jr. plays Divinity, but the character’s gender isn’t mentioned. The same episode, sadly, contains a Harry Potter joke.

In another episode, a queer cis woman talks with her therapist. The therapist mentions her patient didn’t have the words or the experience to fully explore queer aspects of her own identity, due to the way there’s forced heterosexuality everywhere, and the way our society centers that around the pleasure of men. There’s nothing trans there, but it was so wild to see something like that said with regard to anything queer, I had to mention it. 

In another episode Mavis is designing a plus size lingerie launch and says she wants all kinds of models, and specifically mentions trans women among them. Later, at the lingerie showing, she talks about how important it was to give “these queens, kings, and nonbinary royalty” the spotlight they deserve. 

We love to see that kind of easy inclusion!

In episode 7, nonbinary actor Misha Osherovich plays Billy, who uses they/them pronouns.

Survival of the Thickest s2 – 1
Peppermint returns this season, and gets her own subplot, which leads to a wedding. It’s glorious and queer, and at one point she even says she looks forward to growing old with her new husband, especially since she knows that’s not a thing all of our trans sisters get to do. So rare and wild to see this mentioned in… anything. It was really well done.

In one episode, Mavis opens up a bridal gown pop up shop, specifically for women whose bodies don’t conform to the narrow view of most women’s fashion, and she specifically mentions trans women as a group who struggle because of this! More fabulous, easy inclusion from this show.

In another episode, Mavis wears a trans rights shirt, and Khalil creates a painting of Peppermint. He says he was inspired by all she went through, being Black and trans, and how she was “boundaryless.” We love to see it.

Upload s4 – 1
This show has routinely been one of the worst offenders with implicitly transphobic jokes, and this final season was sadly no different. 

There’s a joke in episode 1 about someone they call “the penisless man,” who then appears, naked, without a penis. A ha ha, a man without a penis can you imagine? H I L A R I O U S.

In another episode a man is trying to convince the woman he loves to get back into a relationship with him, and says, “I’m pregnant.” Isn’t that so funny? I can’t stop laughing. They built a whole scene around this entire “joke” a few seasons back, and I guess it’s just so funny to them that they keep going back to it.

Trans woman Gigi Gorgeous appears as basically herself in the finale, but she’s not mentioned as trans. Also she’s just conducting an interview, and doesn’t really have a character to speak of. 

Wayward – 3
Created by and stars nonbinary actor Mae Martin, though their character on the show is a trans man, Alex. The story is a deep trans allegory about the way society gaslights trans people and all the trauma that causes, and how you can’t even trust the people closest to you, who supposedly love you, to not perpetuate that trauma. It’s also a pretty dark story, so keep that in mind going in.

One episode includes discussion of testosterone doses, Alex not having stubble yet, and not being treated like a man at his last job. Top surgery scars are shown.

In episode 3, a girl wants to go to Alex for help, and another girl says “A cop? All they do is wave their dick around,” and the first girl replies, “I don’t think he has a dick.” And it’s not… a joke? I mean it kind of is, but it was more a matter of fact. And not at all intended like the standard, “Yes your honor, this man has no dick,” “joke” that’s used to mock cis men because obvs not having a dick means you’re not a man. It was nuanced and kind of great, and this is what you get when trans people get to tell our own stories!

There’s a sex scene in episode 5, where they definitely don’t treat Alex like a cis man, and I mean that in the most complimentary way possible. It’s filmed as a trans man in a sex scene, and that’s fab.

Nonbinary actor Tricia Black also has a recurring role as Mule, though the character isn’t mentioned as nonbinary.

Misha Osherovich, who played a nonbinary character I mentioned in the report on Survival of the Thickest, was on the writing staff for Wayward.

Witcher s4 – 0
I believe there is a trans or nonbinary actor in the show, playing a character whose gender isn’t mentioned in dialogue, but I couldn’t one hundred percent confirm it, and I’m not looking to speculate or out people who aren’t ready to be out publicly, so we’re gonna just move on.

Yellowjackets s3 – 3
Nonbinary actor Liv Hewson returns as Teen Van, and is part of the main cast, though their character is cis.

Emily St. James and her cis wife are on the writing staff. Nicole Maines returns briefly in one episode, but the character is still not mentioned as trans.

And that’s a wrap on everything I watched in 2025! Let’s look at the totals, from thirty-four movies and thirty-seven seasons of television:

39 trans or nonbinary creatives (writers, actors, and/or directors)
18 trans or nonbinary characters
41 jokes about trans people

Oof.

The numbers look even worse if you remove Clean Slate, which had the most trans rep of anything and has already been canceled, so it won’t be back to boost the numbers next year:

30 trans creatives involved
13 trans characters
41 jokes about trans people

One show should not be carrying nearly a third of all representation! And this is also why it’s so incredibly devastating when trans shows get canceled, because often they account for a disproportionate amount of the representation we actually get.

Also keep in mind that the “trans writers/actors/directors involved” number includes Eve Lindley, Jinx Monsoon, and Peppermint, who all got counted twice, and Yasmin Finney, who was counted three times. If you’re looking for how many trans people were involved as individuals, the number drops from 39 to 34.

Also also, remember that many of the trans actors who are counted in the total were not mentioned as trans, and several of those had all of one line. For example, I really loved Heated Rivalry, and I think it’s hugely important for the queer community right now, and it had two trans people in it! But nobody watching knew they were trans and they each had one line. That is representation on a technicality, but it’s not really doing anything to help the sad state of trans representation in our media.

These were the numbers from 2024:
23 trans or nonbinary creatives
25 trans or nonbinary characters
30 jokes about trans people

These were the numbers from 2023:
31 trans or nonbinary creatives
20 trans or nonbinary characters
16 jokes about trans people

These were the numbers from 2022:
22 trans people
15 jokes about trans people

So what we see is a higher number of trans creatives working on things, which is great! But… far less trans characters on screen, and far more jokes about trans people. In fact 2025 had the lowest on-screen trans representation and the highest amount of jokes punching down at trans people, of any year since I started doing these reports.

I wish I could say that was surprising, but it mirrors how 2025 was the most transphobic year in politics, with the most anti-trans laws passed, than ever before.

I do want to remind you that the actual American public is largely supportive of trans people, and even after the 2024 election, all the Republicans who campaigned on anti-trans rhetoric lost their elections. It’s not a popular position! Most people are not transphobic!

But the political party in power sure is, and despite the fact that words like “liberal Hollywood” get bandied about, the studios are largely all run by incredibly conservative cishet white men. And that group is also largely from the tech sector and are all-in on Republicans, because they don’t want their precious large language model, error-prone, environment-destroying thievery machines to be regulated.

There are good producers and executives fighting to get more inclusive stories out there, but they are also limited in what they’re allowed to do by the people at the very top. 

And even still, cis gatekeepers of trans stories and trans art remain a barrier to getting our stories told. We still need a lot more trans executives and producers to help trans shows and movies get made, but I still don’t have any clue how we make that happen… because it’s going to take those same cis gatekeepers to finally help trans people get hired as executives and producers.

But until we change things behind the scenes to give more trans creators a shot, I fear these numbers will keep getting worse.

Cis producers, executives, and showrunners: hire trans writers, directors, and actors. As often as you can. And help them get their stories told. Please.

And trans and nonbinary creatives, keep telling those stories and fighting to get them out there. I’m in those trenches right along with you, and we’ve got to keep trying.

Because trans people deserve to see ourselves in pop culture, in media, and nobody else is going to do it if we don’t.

Tilly Bridges, end transmission.
tillysbridges@gmail.com

TRANS REPRESENTATION IN 2025 MEDIA part 3: TV part 2

Welcome to Trans Tuesday! It’s time to look at some of the absolute weirdest instances of trans rep, or lack thereof, in TRANS REPRESENTATION IN 2025 MEDIA part 3: TV part 2!

Be sure you’ve read PART 1: MOVIES and PART 2: TV PART 1 first, because these are all part of a whole, and we’re trying to get an idea of the bigger picture of where things are at.

Onward!

Loot s3 – 1
MJ Rodriguez continues to have a lead supporting role as Sofia. But… but but but. See the 2022 and 2024 TRANS REP IN MEDIA REPORTS for the way this show just reallllllly wants to not say Sofia is trans, but alllllso doesn’t want to say she’s cis. 

They keep her in this nebulous area where you just don’t know, meaning most viewers will assume she’s cis and never think twice about it. But it seems like since MJ is such a notable trans actress, they also don’t want to say she’s not trans and piss off all her fans. It’s a very baffling thing.

This isn’t a trans thing, but the season premiere is all about how funny it is that old people have bodies and might still like sex. Which, I feel, kind of illustrates where some of the humor in this show is coming from. We don’t need to make fun of people whose bodies are different in appearance or ability, actually!

Here’s some more weirdness:

In episode 2, Sofia asks a friend to pick up her sister Destiny, who didn’t connect with her real name… Nicole. It’s a joke about names, and how giving yourself your own name is goofy actually. And they gave it to the trans woman, who they won’t say is trans. What the heck?

In this episode, nonbinary actor Jesse Leigh (who stole every scene they were in on Rutherford Falls) has a small role. The character is not mentioned as being nonbinary.

In episode three they’re in England, and there’s food with goofy names, one of which is “soldier’s tit.” Sure.

In episode four, a guy is getting to train his trainers at the gym, and tells them to “suck their fupas in” and “get those tits out.” Two implicit jokes in the span of two sentences, c’mon.

In episode 6, Sofia is mad that Howard is dating her sister, and he says, “We’re being safe, I’m on the pill.” C’MON.

Here’s something really weird. In episode 7, Sofia says she moved across the country to get away from her family, and they’re “very different people,” with no reason given. And then she thanks a group of guys for inviting her to their guy’s game night…. which is a thing a trans woman might be incredibly conflicted about. I cannot comprehend what this show is doing with MJ and her character, it’s baffling.

In episode 8, Arthur is asked to wear an outfit without a shirt, and he says, “My boobs will be out”. We’re… still doing this, I guess.

That outfit is like an open-chested tux with a cape that says “pussy” on the lining, and Molly’s outfit is a giant bow that says “cock” on the lining. You see, because putting words for genitalia associated with one cisgender person on the other cisgender person’s clothes is… funny? In some alternate universe, maybe.

In episode 9, Molly is dating a younger man, and Sofia says, “You’re turning gender roles on their head.” Which is a nothingburger on its own, but again giving that line to the trans woman to say is some kinda weird.

In episode 10, Sofia goes to a congressional representative for legal help, and an aide there mentions she should run for office to take the rep’s place. Hold up. She is trans and someone’s gonna ask her to run for office? Who hasn’t seen the state of American politics, and trans people within that system? What are you doing?? Just acknowledge her transness please! Or at least confirm the character is cis. It’s all so bizarre.

Later in the episode, one cis lady asks another cis lady if she’s, “Yankin’ her rod.”

Man on the Inside s2 – 0
A cranky old man, known for being kind of a bigot, calls Charles (who works for a private investigator) “Nancy Drew.” I think the gag is meant to be “look how this old man is a clueless sexist,” but nobody really reacts to it or calls him on it, or makes him the actual butt of the joke. So sadly all it does is just perpetuate misgendering as funny, which it’s not.

There’s also a lot of teen kids in this who call everyone “bro,” including their mom

Murderbot s1 – 2*
Nonbinary actor Sabrina Wu plays nonbinary character Pin-Lee, they/them pronouns are used.

Murderbot itself is also nonbinary, its pronouns are it/its.

Here’s my issue with this. Murderbot is played by a cis white man, Alexander Skarsgård, and the showrunners are two cis white men. The thing is, not only is Murderbot nonbinary, it experiences all kinds of marginalization and discrimination for being what it is. And to give that role to a cis white man, and have the show run by cis white men, feels like appropriation of a trans role. It’s kind of allowing cis white men to play at being marginalized. And it’s a leading role that should have gone to a nonbinary actor, at the very least.

It’s possible that Alexander Skarsgård, or even one of the showrunners, Paul Weitz and Chris Weitz, is nonbinary and not out, or is nonbinary and doesn’t know it yet, and that is why any (or all!) of them may have been particularly drawn to Murderbot.

But even if that’s the case, you have to be conscious that as far as the entire world knows, you are three cisgender white men who have taken a nonbinary lead character and co-opted them for cisgender white men, and that’s not good. There are so many fabulous nonbinary actors who never get a shot at a lead role, who would have been fabulous.

Not to mention the way you could have undermined the “strong cis white man action hero” type by casting anyone other than a strong cis white man. Murderbot is a robot, it doesn’t need to look muscular! It shoots lasers and has future armor, literally any body type would have worked (and allowed someone who doesn’t look tall, muscular, and imposing to be an action star).

So this one is very complicated for multiple reasons.

Only Murders in the Building s5 – 0
There’s a scene where Oliver is sweating because he’s nervous and someone asks him why he’s sweating, and he says, “Menopause is difficult for everyone.” Le sigh.

Later in the same episode there’s a joke about how his gender-bent version of The Ten Commandments flopped, and that’s not a thing I’d even note for most shows, but given how transphobic this show got last season, I’m not sure if even something as small as that is just a weird joke or some more stealth transphobia sneaking in, because god doesn’t approve of trans people or something. 

This is what happens when you fall into the transphobic joke trap, sometimes you can’t escape and we stop giving you the benefit of the doubt. 

In episode five, okay… some really weird stuff goes down in a way that seems like it’s intentionally trying to stealthily reference transness? This episode features:

Charles (a cis man) goes on testosterone to make him more virile. Everyone’s fine with it, which you might think is a case of CIS PEOPLE GET GENDER AFFIRMING HEALTHCARE TOO, but then he says, “I’ve never been more connected to my body.” Which, like, is what HRT does for trans people?

He then says now he can open jars of… pickles. Specifically pickles. Which are a certified thing with tranfems.

It goes further, because this episode also features milky white suppositories… which is how many trans women take progesterone, which usually comes in milky white pills.

And then a robot is called a “short king,” which is apparently derogatory among cis men (because of course it is), but I hear routinely used as a compliment for trans men.

Like… what is happening here? Is this trying to make up for the massive amounts of implicitly transphobic jokes in season four? Is it also meant to be derogatory digs at trans people? So much in one episode feels like it cannot be coincidence, but I also cannot parse what they were trying to say with it. Not counting it as jokes at our expense, but it was definitely worth mentioning, even though it’s baffling.

In another episode, Oliver gets made fun of for wearing turquoise cowboy boots. Someone asks, “Are those women’s?” His reply, “They’re unisex.” And there’s a joke about Warren Buffet shaving his bikini line (because he’s a dude and dudes don’t wear bikinis! haw haw haw).

In a later episode there’s a joke about Oliver going to a manicurist, after he was just sexist about women going to them. And a woman walks into a room of two men and two women and says, “What’s up ladies?” Then later says, “Let’s go, ladies.” It feels it’s intended to be derogatory, and not like someone saying “guys” is just an example of societal sexism. And Mabel says, annoyed, that the defining characteristic of a “ladies night” is everyone having a uterus.

But not all women have a uterus, thank you.

The finale reveals that Charles was on a placebo, and not actually on testosterone, further muddling whatever was going on in episode five’s multiple stealth trans references.

The Pitt s1 – 2
Supriya Ganesh uses she/they pronouns, and plays Samira Mohan, who is cis. 

In episode 4 there’s a trans woman sommelier, played by trans woman Ava Everett Irving, who’s a patient in the ER. We find out she’s trans because when they call her back she’s deadnamed, because that’s what’s on her insurance. That’s a big oof, but it’s also a real thing a lot of trans people have to deal with (I have personally been there). Before she leaves, one of the doctors notices her gender and name were wrong in the system, and changed them without even being asked. That’s great, and a fine example of PROACTIVE ALLYSHIP.

On the one hand, this is really great representation that presents a trans woman as a human worthy of dignity and respect just like every cis person is, and even provides a great example to cis people of how to be an accomplice.

But also her entire appearance revolves around getting deadnamed, and while that is a real thing a lot of us deal with all too often, it’s also hard when the only context we show up in, in the entire season of a show, is about discrimination and barriers we face. This is part of the problem with there being so fucking little actual trans representation, too often it all revolves around our pain and suffering. 

If we had tons of trans rep with a wide variety of depictions, one or two that only touch on difficult things we experience wouldn’t be an issue at all. So this isn’t The Pitt’s fault, they did a good job, though adding another trans character somewhere who didn’t have to deal with transphobia would’ve helped. It’s just sad this is the state of trans representation in media.

In the finale, a cis woman says she thought the reason a cis man coworker went home early was because he’s a pussy. C’mon, we don’t need to do that.

Plur1bus s1 – 0
I love this show and the way it comments on the evils of colonialism, racism, xenophobia, assimilation, and the way fascism wants to flatten everything beautiful and unique about humanity into a dull beige paste.

I am continually haunted by the way the hive erases culture and art, and how queer and trans people no longer exist within the hive. The show has sparked more amazing philosophical discussions than any other presently running, and I love that. It really makes you think.

Carol’s wife dies in the premiere, and while that’s absolutely a case of the “bury your gays” trope, it serves an important story point and is needed to set up Carol’s relationship with the hive. But this is another instance of there just not being enough good queer representation in shows, just like I talked about with The Pitt.

If we had a lot of great queer rep, one queer spouse dying wouldn’t be a big deal. It wouldn’t even be a trope, it’d be like one member of a cishet couple dying… just another story point (provided that didn’t also fall into the Women in Refrigerators trope). But when there’s so very little good queer rep, seeing an instance of a happy queer relationship broken by a death, again, is difficult.

In episode 8, Carol writes a new chapter in her book series, and the male love interest she’d always wished she could have made a woman, but felt she couldn’t due to homophobia in the publishing world, is going to change to a woman via magical means. There’s no mention of trans people or what transness means in the fictional world she created, though, or even acknowledgement of the character in her book being trans.

When talking to Zosia, who represents the hive, Carol keeps pushing her to use singular pronouns, to say “I” instead of “we.” Zosia struggles, and Carol says, “All the brains in the world and you can’t navigate a fucking pronoun.” Which feels very much like a trans-supportive joke, and I am here for it.

Poker Face s2 – 2*
In one episode a guy calls a cis woman, “Dude,” and she later says “I’m a grown-ass man.” Not counting the “dude” as an intentional misgendering (it’s just societal sexism in language), but her misgendering herself for humor is certainly a joke at our expense.

Nonbinary actor Nicole Orabona plays a bartender in an episode, but the character’s gender isn’t mentioned.

Trans woman Patti Harrison plays Alex, a recurring role that is… somewhat problematic. Her character is not mentioned as trans.

In one episode she joins a gym with a cis lady, and calls the two of them “gym bros.” Weird thing to make a trans lady say, effectively misgendering herself, even if the character isn’t trans.

In the finale it’s revealed that her character Alex is a killer, but that’s not all. She goes by “Iguana” and is so good at disguises that she can look like anyone. Everyone also thinks Iguana is a guy, but surprise! It’s the trans woman. In this episode she says she “choked off all her humanity,” and “I don’t really do physical pleasure.”

Despite the character never being mentioned as trans, they hit multiple harmful trans tropes: the “Surprise, my gender is different than you thought” trope, the “trans people aren’t human” trope, the “trans people as tricksters” trope, and the “trans people can’t experience physical pleasure after transition” trope. All of them are bullshit, dehumanizing propaganda about us.

So while the character of Alex wasn’t mentioned as trans, it sure as hell feels like the show itself treats her like she was… and punished her, and all the rest of us, for it. Supremely uncool.

And I’m not saying trans people can’t be assassins or serial killers in stories, we can and should play evil and bad characters too. But if that’s all we are, and along the way you reconfirm and perpetuate a ton of false bullshit about us… we’d be better off if you never added us to your show at all. 

First do no harm, damn.

We’ll leave it there for this week, but come back next week as we discuss trans rep in the rest of the complete television seasons I saw, and then look at the overall numbers… and compare them to past years.

The results may, or may not, surprise you.

Tilly Bridges, end transmission.
tillysbridges@gmail.com

PS – PART 4 is here!

TRANS REPRESENTATION IN 2025 MEDIA part 2: TV part 1

Welcome to Trans Tuesday! How did TV go in terms of trans rep in 2025? So glad you asked, because here comes TRANS REPRESENTATION IN 2025 MEDIA part 2: TV part 1!

If you haven’t read TRANS REP IN 2025 MEDIA, part 1: MOVIES yet, do so! It’s got all the contextual goodness that explains what the heck I’m doing (and not doing) in this report.

Okeydokey, onward through complete seasons of tv I watched in 2025!

TV

Alien: Earth s1 – 0
The opening of the season, especially the pilot, reads as really trans. I’m not sure if that allegory sort of falls apart as the season goes on, because I haven’t examined all eight hours of it super closely. So it might hold up, but it also might not.

In one episode, a cis man marine says “I should’ve called in sick,” when looking at a crashed ship they have to search. And the cis man marine next to him says, “that’s okay, I’ve got extra panties in my pack”. 

Like… because not wanting to go into a crashed spaceship makes you a girl who will piss herself, I guess? UGH. 

Arcane s2 – 1
Trans woman Eve Lindley (mentioned back in Part 1 for her starring role in National Anthem) voices the character Lest. Lest is not mentioned as trans.

The Bear s4 – 0
In the premiere, Ebrahim and Tina misgender each other for fun. Again. This is turning the one time this happened in season three into a running gag, I guess. But misgendering isn’t funny, y’know?

The Chair Company s1 – 1
Eileen Noonan (a friend of mine!) plays Westie in three episodes, though the role is small. Westie isn’t mentioned as trans. Eileen was one of the first guests ever on the podcast version of Trans Tuesdays! Listen to her way back in episode 4 on TRANS ROLES AND STORIES (and who gets to play them and tell them).

Clean Slate – 9+!
This show was definitely the GOAT of trans rep last year. It was, as is all too common with deeply (and visibly) trans shows, summarily canceled shortly after the first season debuted. It’s a charming sitcom about a trans woman moving back home to live with her dad.

Trans woman icon Laverne Cox co-created and stars in the show, trans woman icon Alexandra Billings appears in the pilot, trans woman icon Nicole Maines has a hilarious role in one episode (I know her, she’s lovely), and trans women Jojo Brown, Eva Reign, and Jazzmun also appear.

Trans man Jett Garrison directed an episode (I know him, he’s lovely), there were two (Two?! Unheard of!) trans women writers on staff, Shadi Petosky and Shomari Kirkwood (a friend of mine, who was on the podcast version of Trans Tuesdays, check out episode 110 on HORMONE REPLACEMENT THERAPY and episode 111 on PUSHBACK OVERKILL.)

Okay dang I didn’t realize I knew so many people who worked on this show. 

As a gentle caution, there’s some deadnaming and misgendering in the pilot, because the dad “needs to figure it out.” But it’s not malicious, it’s presented as a thing an older cis person with no trans experience might struggle with.

The lead is allowed to be flawed and real, and it’s about her adjusting to small-town life and kinda falling for a guy. It’s a kind, heartwarming show, if you need trans rep like that in your life right now.

Cobra Kai s6 – 0
There’s a baby gender reveal party this season, and it just sucks to see that same kind of terrible “cis boys and girls are the only option, and we decide it at birth based on their genitals” ideas continue to perpetuate not just society, but also our art. Not going to count this as a joke or anything, but can we just stop with those already? We didn’t used to have them! We can get by without them!

There’s also a scene of a couple old guys calling each other “pussy” and getting mad about it, so it’s cool that “association with something typically seen as feminine” continues to be just the worst thing that could happen to dudes.

This one definitely goes in the joke column.

Doctor Who special The Star Beast – 1
Yasmin Finney plays Rose, the trans/nonbinary daughter of Donna. 

The plot kind of hinges around her being outside the binary, and it felt a bit like they had to invent a reason to have a trans person on the show, rather than just saying hey Donna’s daughter is trans. 

There are multiple instances of Rose being deadnamed, and also accidentally misgendered while she’s not around, which is presented as something that’s tough for the cis people in her life (but we never see Rose’s side of it, and she doesn’t really have much going on outside of what she needs to remember about the Doctor for the plot, so she feels like half a character to me). Soooo that’s not great. Imagine a show including a trans character… and then immediately diving into CIS GRIEF. See the Trans Tuesday on that if you wanna learn about some bullshit.

And it feels like they do all of this to show you that she’s trans, but the word “trans” is never said, when it’s the easiest thing to do. The episode also has a misgendering joke when the doctor shows someone his psychic paper, and it lists his title as “mistress” instead of “mister,” and he grumbles about it not keeping up (the Doctor’s previous incarnation was a woman, played by Jodie Whittaker). But this moment? It’s entirely for laughs. Ha ha, this man identified himself as a woman, oopsie. Blerg.

Allllso… when Jodie Whittaker’s doctor regenerated into David Tennant’s Doctor take two, his clothes changed from her normal outfit to Tenant’s standard suit and long coat. No other doctor in the modern incarnation of this show up to that point, when regenerating, had their clothes change. They were always a new Doctor in the old Doctor’s clothes. So here, they changed the clothes with the regeneration to avoid putting cis man Tenant in cis woman Whittaker’s clothing… even though her costume was incredibly gender neutral, by Whittaker’s choice!

And I mention all of this only because they went to lengths to change the clothing with the regeneration to avoid the “uncomfortable gender stuff” of seeing a cis man in a cis woman’s costume, but then made a joke about “isn’t it funny that his psychic paper still thinks he’s a woman.” 

It’s a bit weird. I felt like the heart was in the right place with this, but it all felt a little inelegant to me. And it’s def not good that all the cis people and their feelings were centered over those of actual trans character Rose, who didn’t get to be much of a character at all. This one is both a joke and actor and character rep, tho.

Doctor who s14 – 3
Rose returns several times, and is often the tallest person in the room (this is trans girl realism, even if unintentional). She, sadly, never really has anything to do, and doesn’t have much of a character. And that’s extra sad, because Yasmin Finney has shown us how good an actor she is in Heartstopper.

In the episode The Devil’s Chord, Maestro (a campy villain) is non-binary, and played by transfem nonbinary actor Jinkx Monsoon. During the episode, the Doctor calls them “that thing.” Ruby, the Doctor’s companion, later calls Maestro “this creature.”

Yoooo, what the hell?! Like, yes, the Maestro is a demon, but… how can you not be aware of the dehumanization of trans people? Enough to call them a “thing” and a “creature?” It’s a bad look.

These don’t count as jokes, mind you, but the execution of the representation felt like maybe it shoulda been run by some trans people first. This is why you need trans writers on your writing staff, friends.

In the episode Dot and Bubble, trans man Pete MacHale plays Gothic Paul. The character is not mentioned as trans. 

So what we’ve got here is three trans actors, one of whom doesn’t have much of anything to do or in the way of character, one who’s othered and called a “thing,” and one who could have been playing a cis character. None of this counts as jokes or bad representation, but I also wouldn’t call any of this good representation either.

Doctor Who s15 – 2
Rose again appears in the season finale, but only has a couple of exposition lines and it literally would be no different if she weren’t there. Sigh. As these were all separate appearances for Rose (and not all within the same season), I’m counting them as three separate appearances for a trans character and actor. But remember that when we get to the totals, because it’s going to maybe make things look like there’s more rep than there is.

The episode The Interstellar Song Contest is a pretty fabulous trans allegory, and was written by trans woman Juno Dawson. After seeing this episode I posted on BlueSky “Doctor Who says trans rights!” and Juno liked that post, so it feels pretty likely the allegory was intentional.  But alllllso… Juno Dawson said she intended it as an allegory about Ukraine and Russia, and there’s also a lot of context about Eurovision that I just didn’t have, which makes this episode a Palestine and Israel allegory, and not in a good way. Credit to my friend and lovely human Jessie Gender for getting me that context I was missing. Here’s a very good explainer about it, along with the hit or miss history of British colonialism allegories in Doctor Who.

Duster s1 – 0
In the pilot in response to hearing about a lady FBI agent, someone says, “They got lady dicks now?” And the characters (two cis men) don’t laugh or treat it like it a joke, but the show kind of does. Because it seems like you’d only word it that way if the concept of “lady dicks” was meant to elicit a chuckle?

Foundation s3 – 0

Hacks s4 – 1
Nonbinary actor Carl Clemons-Hopkins plays Marcus, who is a cis man.

There’s a minor character named Ceecee Heauxmeaux, which is beyond the purview of my writeup on trans rep, but that sure feels like a kind of regressive thing to think is funny. Unless a queer person wrote it, which changes the context entirely. No idea who came up with that line, the credited writer on an episode didn’t always write every line or joke that appears in it, but it’s… well I’m gonna classify it as “weird.”

In one episode there’s a joke from Debra about how she shouldn’t have to be told someone’s pronouns when she didn’t ask. We’re still making jokes about pronouns, apparently.

In another episode there’s a joke about not wanting to hear complaints about the gender of Mr. Coffee. C’mon.

In one episode a cis woman jokes she’s “doing no nut November.”

In another episode Jimmy Kimmel, guest starring as himself, tells Debra to “Go shove your dick up Fallon’s ass.”

In another episode Ava, a cis bi woman, buys books for a baby, and the titles of two of them are jokes about gender – “One Fish, Two Fish, They Fish,” and “Which Bathroom is Nonbinary?” She says she got so excited when she saw them. The mom of the baby blinks in confusion. I want to note that if this scene were played earnestly, it’d actually be a good commentary about how kids actually should have books about being nonbinary, to better understand themselves or others. Instead the scene is played as a joke about how “wacko liberal” Ava is.

The penultimate episode of the season has a Harry Potter reference, a man throwing a purse over his shoulder and swinging it around for comedy, and a cis woman saying to a cis man, “We’re a couple of business guys.” Not gonna cool it as the season winds down, I guess.

Then in the season finale, Deborah says Ava needs “a boyfriend, or a girlfriend, or a theyfriend” … and for once it’s not played as a joke! Great. Yes. We can learn and grow! Buuuutt the same episode has a couple jokes about… Ace Ventura, and what the hell. When you reference one of the most transphobic movies ever made, that kinda casts doubt on the authenticity of your “you need a theyfriend” line, and now I wonder if it was meant as a joke that just didn’t land.

Look, I love this show a lot. It’s got really brilliant acting and writing.

But also in my past trans rep in media reports, it’s been one of the biggest traffickers in this kind of tired gender humor that pokes trans people in the eye. And the wild thing is there’s no reason for it, the show is brilliant otherwise! What are you doing with these lazy, gender essentialist jokes? I tallied eight of them this season! Stop it!

Hazbin Hotel s2 – 0

Heated Rivalry s1 – 2
Trans Man Harrison Browne appears in one episode in a small role, with only a few lines. He was a professional hockey player in the National Women’s Hockey League and the first out trans athlete in professional hockey, and he helped form the first ever transgender policy in professional sports. It was a lovely nod to include him, but as he’s actually an actor and director now, it would have been extra great if he had more than a tiny role that didn’t impact anything.

Trans woman Miss Niki Nikita appears in episode 5 as a makeup artist, but has only one line and isn’t mentioned as trans.

The show is fearless in the ways it depicts love and sex between (cis) queer men, and includes a lovely, awkward coming out scene that I think trans people will resonate with.

Ironheart s1 – 1
Nonbinary actor Shea Couleé has a recurring role as Slug, and they/them pronouns are used. I think this makes them the MCU’s first official non-cis character! Which is amazing, but also when you think about how many characters have appeared in every Marvel movie and tv show combined… incredibly depressing that there’s only one, and it took eighteen years for it to happen. Ugh.

On the show Slug is a villain, and you could make a case they might be overly sexualized, but there’s nothing otherwise damaging about the portrayal.

Jentry Chau vs the Underworld – 0

Last of Us s2 – 1
Nonbinary actor Bella Ramsey continues to star as cis girl Ellie.

It seemed like they were possibly toying with the idea of letting Ellie be nonbinary too. There’s a scene where Ellie finds out her girlfriend is pregnant (by an ex-boyfriend), and says “I’m gonna be a dad.” It’s not played for laughs, it’s a genuinely sweet moment.

Bella said they wore a binder under their costume during “ninety percent” of filming (see TUCKING AND BINDING for more). The binder seems visible under their top in some shots, so I thought they really were gonna make Ellie nonbinary as well.

But later they take off their shirt, so someone can tend to wounds on their back and… there’s no binder. So it seems the times it might have been visible is because Bella was wearing it, with no intent to have Ellie be seen in it. 

And that’s fine, trans and nonbinary actors can play cis characters. The reverse is not fine, mind you, for reasons outlined in TRANS ROLES AND STORIES.

But it’s allllso fine for Ellie to be nonbinary. There’s no reason the character must be a cis girl. You can have the character come out as nonbinary, too, and let Bella rep who they really are through the art they’re making. It doesn’t change the story at all!

Leverage Redemption s3 – 1
The show has a nonbinary writer on one episode, which includes the line, “Ladies and gentlemen, and all the beautiful people in between.” Hey, that’s cool. 

Come back next week for part 3, as we discuss some shows that have a decidedly weird track record when it comes to trans rep.

Tilly Bridges, end transmission.
tillysbridges@gmail.com

PS – Part 3 is here!

TRANS REPRESENTATION IN 2025 MEDIA part 1: MOVIES

Welcome to Trans Tuesday! It’s time once again for my annual report on the good, the bad, and the yikes in popular culture. Here comes TRANS REPRESENTATION IN 2025 MEDIA part 1: MOVIES!

These reports have become some of the most popular essays and podcast episodes across Trans Tuesdays, and that’s fab. I talk about this stuff because nothing will ever get better if we don’t discuss these things. 

Pop culture holds enormous power in shaping the thoughts and feelings of those who see it, this is famously the entire point of art. And how trans people are portrayed in our most popular art forms tells us a lot about where society is (and is headed), and helps us see shifting opinions on us in society.

My past reports have shown a decline over time in good, authentic trans representation on screen, and behind the scenes, while showing a corresponding increase in jokes at our expense. See the 2022, 2023, and 2024 TRANS REP IN MEDIA reports for more on that. These reports actually predicted (or mirrored?) the shifting political headwinds as trans people became a larger target of the bigoted Republican party in the US. You could see the shift in our artistic representation happening, and then the 2024 election corroborated the shifting viewpoints in the results.

Movies and television take a long time to make, and much of what I will report on was made in the year(s) prior to the year of release. So again we see that shift happening as public perception of trans people more drastically shifted, as the propaganda and lies about us increased. It’s fascinating! And bad. Bad bad bad.

Every Trans Tuesday is someone’s first, so if you’re new to my trans rep in media reports, here’s the standard disclaimers. I’ll mention the title of the movie or show, and how many trans and nonbinary people (or jokes about us) appeared.

This report covers only scripted films and television that are fiction. I do not cover documentaries or “reality” tv, as the point is to look at how we’re appearing in the stories we tell and at whose stories are allowed to be told in popular media. I also am only reporting on films I saw all of, and shows I saw an entire season of. If I don’t see the full story, I can’t have an accurate picture of things.

This report covers only if trans people appeared (and in what context), and is not meant as a comment on the show or film’s overall quality. Plenty of things I love may have had moments of bad representation, or even no representation at all. Also I can only count trans people who are out as trans, for obvious reasons. Trans people who are stealth, or eggs who haven’t cracked yet, obviously cannot be determined.

In fact, as you’ll see, “no trans people at all” is the most common finding. There are also times when representation happens, but it’s in something I really don’t like. Sometimes it’s in things that are actively harmful to the entire trans community. See BAD REPRESENTATION: EMILIA PEREZ for more on how sometimes it is actually preferable for cis people to just… not do the thing they want to do with a trans character.

When this report talks about jokes at our expense, you need to understand they’re almost never overt “I hate trans people!” jokes. They’re implicit trans jokes, in that the people making them likely do not even know their joke is punching down at trans people.

Our society tells us men and women are “supposed” to be a certain way, and any deviation from that is to be mocked. Most often these are things like “that man has no balls or a small dick” or “this woman is talking about having a penis.” Most often, you’ll see this show up any time a perceived man does something that is perceived as feminine, or appears feminine, or is compared to a woman in a derogatory way. And every single time, if you stop to ask yourself why those are meant to be funny, it’s because our society has trained us all that the very idea of those things is just fucking hilarious. 

Those jokes are absolutely about mocking the reality trans people live in, but the people making those jokes (mostly) have no idea. They’re just perpetuating what society trained them to think, and in perpetuating those things, are training everyone watching to perpetuate it further.

If you want to know more about how implicit biases work and worm their way into us all (yes, all, even me and even you), see IMPLICIT QUEERPHOBIA, where you’ll see a cishet person’s reaction to queer and trans media illustrate this effect perfectly.

Also please note that I am but one exhausted and very hot woman, logging every single thing I watch for an entire year. It is so much work, and also I am bound to miss things. This is actually why addressing that a character is trans in-story is so important, because if you don’t, people are likely to miss it… even a trans screenwriter and director who is specifically looking for it. I’m trying my best!

Also also, this is not necessarily only things that were released in 2025 (though it largely is), but it’s things I saw in 2025. Our oversaturated media landscape makes it impossible for anyone to see everything that’s released, and sometimes you don’t even hear about something until a year or two after it’s out.

So everything in this report is either from 2025, or was released within a few years of 2025. I’m trying to find modern trends and representation, not stuff from older media. 

At the very end of these four trans rep in 2025 media essays, I will tally and post the totals, and then we’ll compare with past years and look for any trends. Will rep get better? Worse? Stay about even? Stick around and find out.

And the final disclaimer: to talk about these things, we have to talk about these things, which means spoilers abound. Be ye warned!

All right, let’s dive in, starting with:

MOVIES

Boiling Point – 0

Captain America Brave New World – 0

Companion – 0

The Day the World Blew Up – 0??
This is a Looney Tunes animated film, which contains a plot point that Daffy Duck has to lay eggs. He is… male. He has always been portrayed that way since his first appearance in 1937, 89 years ago. And in case you were wondering if they might’ve changed that for this film… Daffy confirms he’s a dude in this movie’s dialogue. 

He also loses all his feathers at one point and has… nipples. WHY?! Ducks do not have nipples! So either this is an instance of the oft-repeated “Ha ha wouldn’t it be funny if a man could get pregnant” (which some trans guys actually can) “joke,” or… Daffy Duck is transmasc. 

Do I think Warner Bros. is making a statement that Daffy Duck is trans? Y’know what, I do not. So this is our first count of an implicit joke at our expense.

Deep Cover – 0

Emily the Criminal – 0

Fantastic Four First Steps – 0

Flow – 0

Frankenstein (GdT) – 0
All Frankenstein adaptations are kinda transy, in my opinion, and the story in this film is kinda transy, but there’s no actual representation happening.

Good Boy – 0

The Gorge – 0

Hundreds of Beavers – 0

Jules– 0

Kpop Demon Hunters – 0
No transness here, but a lot of people think it’s a trans allegory. I have… thoughts about that, but they’re probably not what you think! Look for a report on it later this year.

M3gan – 0

Man and Witch: The Dance of a Thousand Steps – 1
Suzie Eddie Izzard plays… the voice of a goose. So we can’t count this as character representation (though to be honest, what trans person doesn’t identify with geese, amirite?), but it’s actor rep.

The Map of Tiny Perfect Things – 0

Mickey 17 – 0

National Anthem – 2* 
Trans woman Eve Lindley stars as Sky, and nonbinary icon Mason Alexander Park has a big supporting role. I suspect there are more trans or nonbinary actors in this cast, but it’s an independent film that got a streaming release, and so information on a lot of the actors in smaller roles was difficult to find.

It’s about a little refuge of queer and trans people living together in a house… well no, strike that. It’s about a cis white guy who discovers them and has a queer awakening, and falls in love with Sky. 

It’s written and directed by a cis man, based on a monograph he wrote while interviewing people at rodeos (a rodeo is featured in the film), after loving them as a kid and then being surprised at how queerphobic and transphobic they were.

This isn’t a trans story you’re getting, per se, but it’s a very queer one, and the trans rep feels authentic to me, perhaps due to it being based on those aforementioned interviews the creator did with trans people, or perhaps from his own personal experience if the film is more autobiographical than fiction. To be clear it is fiction, but we know it was at least in part based on real conversations he had with real people, so the line in there is fuzzy.

But if you’re looking for a (mostly) gentle and contemplative indie film with good trans rep, you could do far worse than National Anthem.

O’Dessa – 0
So this isn’t a trans film, but it’s a very trans film, if you catch my meaning. I’d really love to do a full trans allegory deep-dive on it, but it’s so very unknown that I think it’d not really be helpful to a lot of people. And not only is this a super trans film, it is very gender. Here’s some highlights:

The main character is the titular O’Dessa, a girl. And her father says to her, “Pecker or no, you’re the seventh son.” Like, how trans is it? Very trans.

There’s a man who wears high heels, like, all the time.

It’s a musical, and in one of the songs it talks about “Mother Nature’s beard.”

O’Dessa cuts all her hair off to look less like a girl. She sleeps in boxer shorts and a tank top.

She ends up being pretty butch, and is in love with a very feminine man. When they’re going to get married, she wears a suit and the guy wears a veil. The preacher then calls her the “prodigal son.”

It’s incredibly stylistic, has a lot to say about fighting conformity and fascism (directly!), and the songs are actually… really good? It stars Sadie Sink from Stranger Things, and the girl can sing (who knew?).

Definitely worth checking out.

Red Sonja – 2
This film was directed by trans woman M. J. Bassett, and trans woman Danica Davis has a small role (the character is not mentioned as trans).

Saving Buddy Charles – 1*
Non-binary actor (and friend of mine!) Analesa Fisher plays Clara, who’s a cis girl. This has a lot of the two main cis girl characters calling each other “dude” and “bro.” And I get that’s how today’s teens talk, but also that sure is gendered, ain’t it? 

I tracked more of that in last year’s report, but honestly it’s not specifically trans-related and it happens so much that I gave up on tracking it all. But once you look for it, you can’t help but spot it. And you never really see words that actually mean women being applied to people regardless of their actual gender, do you? It’s part of our society implicitly saying men are the default and what everyone should aspire to be. Stop doing it, maybe! See CIS IS NOT A SLUR (there is no default human).

Anyway, Analesa’s so good, so if an indie teen road trip is your jam, go see them give a truly great performance. It’s on Tubi.

Sinners – 0

Spinal Tap II – 0
A music promoter says Kpop is really popular and that he works with a Kpop band… but they’re not really Korean, they “identify as Korean.” Boooooooooo. Listen, this one is really insidious, because obviously people who are not Korean cannot identify as Korean. That’s not how it works. But that is how gender works, because gender’s a social construct. Gender, and yes, sex, can change. But this joke basically intimates that gender and sex cannot change, and that makes it entirely full of bullshit.

Star Trek: Section 31 – 0

Superman – 0
There’s no trans rep here, but the movie is very quietly trans-affirming. Essay about that coming in a month or so.

Thelma – 0

Thunderbolts – 0

Train Dreams – 0

Wake Up Dead Man – 0
There’s a bro who wants to be a Republican politician, and to whip up votes he says he tried “the trans thing” and “the pronoun thing.” But they’re literally in the middle of a long list of things Republicans get performatively mad about, to score points with bigots. They’re not at all at our expense, so no issues here.

We’re All Going to the World’s Fair – 1 
Written and directed by Jane Schoenbrun, who is nonbinary. And the film is absolutely about gender dysphoria, much in the way Schoenbrun’s next film, I SAW THE TV GLOW, was. I did a full write-up on IStTVG, but I don’t intend to for this film.

The allegory here is a little more obtuse and obfuscated, which makes sense as Schoenbrun said they didn’t realize the film was actually about dysphoria until partway through shooting it, when it cracked their egg.

That doesn’t mean they weren’t intentionally making a film about gender dysphoria, mind you, just that they were exploring it subconsciously and didn’t consciously realize it until filming, when they realized they were trans.

There is a trans woman who briefly appears on-screen, but she’s not an actual character and has no lines.

The Wild Robot – 0

Wish – 0

You Hurt My Feelings – 0

So across thirty-four new (or relatively new) films, I found seven trans people, two confirmed trans characters, and… two jokes.

It’s kinda dismal that we don’t have more representation in there, but there was nothing actually harmful, and that even those extremely low counts of trans people and characters outnumber the jokes is actually pretty stunning.

Will that hold up as we progress through all the television I watched?

Only one way to find out! Come back next week as we dive into 2025 trans rep in media part 2, television part 1!

Tilly Bridges, end transmission.
tillysbridges@gmail.com

PS – Part 2 is here!

THE UNINTENTIONALLY INTENTIONAL TRANS ALLEGORY OF LISA FRANKENSTEIN, part 8

Welcome to Trans Tuesday! Tillyvision dial set to max bronze for THE UNINTENTIONALLY INTENTIONAL TRANS ALLEGORY OF LISA FRANKENSTEIN, part 8! This week, we get all the transition care we need and self-actualization arrives!

For the last time (in this series, anyway), I’m gonna pester you to be sure you’ve read PART 1, PART 2, PART 3, PART 4, PART 5, PART 6, and PART 7 first. I know, I know, it’s a lot of parts. Don’t blame me, I didn’t make this movie! All I did was love it. Yeah!

Let’s get this wrapped up!

1:24:48 – Frank leaves with the trash can that Michael’s penis and testicles landed in. Frank wants those things. And we know Lisa has bottom dysphoria, and Frank is Lisa’s self-actualization, sooooo… you know where this is going.

1:24:55 – Even still, Lisa goes to comfort Taffy, to try and make her feel better. Having to manage the feelings of the cis people in our lives when we come out, even though we are the ones society makes it so difficult for, is a very real thing we have to do. Often. CIS GRIEF rears its head again.

1:25:22 – Inside Taffy’s red car, with Taffy’s red face, Lisa still tries to comfort her, but Taffy pulls away. Horrified by Lisa’s truth.

1:25:58 – Lisa is still trying to comfort Taffy, who’s terrified. Lisa: “Thank you for being nice to me when no one else was. I did notice. It was just that your mom was so heinous that I- I’d already decided that you were, too. You’re the type of person who usually bullies me or looks right through me. But you didn’t. You actually went out of your way to try to tell people I was part of your family. You really actually wanted me to be your sister [emphasis mine].”

Even people who might accept us as nonconforming people of the gender we were assigned at birth cannot handle or accept us once they learn we’re actually trans. See CIS SPOUSAL AND PARTNER SUPPORT for more.

1:26:39 – Lisa gives Taffy her mom’s rosary, those old fears and feelings will no longer hold her back! They do, however, belong to Taffy… now that she’s revealed her true, traitorous self, and betrayed Lisa.

Lisa: “You are, you know? You are my sister. You’re a great person, Taff. And I’m sorry… I hurt you. I love you.” We do love the people in our lives, and we never meant to hurt them. Coming out as trans shouldn’t hurt them, though. And society teaches us that we have to apologize for our very existence, for wanting to stop living a lie and be free from pain, just because cis feelings are hurt. And that’s bullshit.

Wave of Mutilation (UK Surf) by Pixies plays. More lyrics? Hell yeah

Cease to resist, giving my goodbye
Drive my car into the ocean
You’ll think I’m dead, but I sail away
On a wave of mutilation
A wave of mutilation
Wave of mutilation

You will think I’m dead, just like Lisa’s mom did, but Lisa’s going off to be her true self. And she won’t drown under the water of dysphoria, she’ll sail across it. With the body modifications she needs, which a whole lot of cis people sure view as “multiation.”

1:27:22 – Lisa picks up the axe (used to sever and obtain Michael’s genitalia), seemingly to go kill Frank? Cis grief has made her feel so bad she’s going to try to kill her true self for good.

1:27:51 – Lisa ducks under the yellow fear tape to get to Frank. But she’s now crossed the line of fear, it’s behind her now… and she can’t kill Frank. She can’t kill her truth. And so:

1:28:06 – She embraces her true self! Lisa: “You love me?” (do I love myself enough to do this?) “You love me?” She does. He does. I do. (marriage!)

1:28:36 – Lisa: “Listen, we’re running out of time. Make love to me.

1:28:44 – Frank looks down, then grunts in discomfort.

1:28:54 – Frank puts Lisa’s hand on his crotch. Lisa: “Oh. Oh. Oh!”

1:29:12 – Lisa’s asking herself if she can transition and be the man she wants to be without the thing our sexist gendered society says you need to be a man. And she confirms it to herself.

HERE COMES THE TRANSIEST THING IN THE ENTIRE MOVIE:

Lisa: “That’s okay. We can… I mean, you don’t need one of those to be a man.”

YOU DON’T NEED A PENIS TO BE A MAN.

Genitalia does not determine gender. You don’t have to get bottom surgery to be a man.

Lisa: “It’s actually like the least important part, really. We can do other things and it’s fine, it’s fine.”

1:29:23 – But Frank has Michael’s junk. You don’t need bottom surgery to be a trans man, but if you’re a trans man who needs bottom surgery then you should get it.

But either way, it’s not the thing that determines the gender you know yourself to be.

1:29:29 – Lisa: “You cut it off for me?” Yes, we will get gender confirmation surgeries if it’s what we need. And sometimes that means modifying our bodies in ways we need to live authentic lives.

Cis people do this allllllllllll the time, even while being horrified by, and legislating against, trans people doing the very same things. Again and again this comes up, please read it: CIS PEOPLE GET GENDER AFFIRMING HEALTHCARE TOO.

1:29:31 – When Lisa and Frank are closer than they’ve ever been, a police officer, aka the people who literally police gender in our society, comes in to break it up. “This is an active crime scene. You guys can’t be here.”

Women don’t belong in a grove for bachelors, this is unacceptable! (It’s worth noting actual cops are, as a group, incredibly hostile to trans people).

As in THE MATRIX films, police (and security guards, and Agents) are the tools the system uses to oppress trans people.

1:29:43 – Frank drops the cop in a grave. Your “rules” in support of THE FALSE DICHOTOMY and oppression will not stop me. They no longer apply to me. I’ve seen through the lies.

1:29:54 – Lisa, in what is intentionally a very sexually suggestive pose, attaches the genitalia her true self needs. Bottom surgery. Note the large “penis” grave drawing we saw earlier is right next to them. And what’s to the left of that? A women in old-timey high-fem clothing, like Lisa was wearing in her dream, but it’s in negative, the black and white are reversed. That’s the opposite of what she wants.

REO Speedwagon’s I Can’t Fight this Feeling Any Longer plays, but it’s a cover with a woman singing… a perceived gender change.

1:30:12 – On the black wooden cat behind Frank, it says “Feed the kitty.” Which, ummmm, may be a thing Frank can do after bottom surgery, if you… follow the euphemism.

1:30:23 – They come out of the shed with the magic electric tanning bed, the surgery, and the HRT, are complete.

1:30:29 – Frank kisses her hand. Acceptance. Thanks. And a goodbye to the person he was, who got him here. Look how Frank is now more human in appearance than ever.

1:30:38 – He puts a candy ring on Lisa’s finger, the two are now one. Their marriage. Their union. Frank will be all there is.

1:31:14 – Another kiss of self-acceptance.

1:31:53 – They change positions. He is now where she was.

1:32:01 – Returning to the opening animation style, they ride a rocket to the stars together.

1:32:07 – Their rocket crashes into the man in the moon and they walk across his surface, over and beyond. She did it. He did it. They’re here, and going further than they ever dreamed they could.

1:32:28 – After consummating their union, and gaining full acceptance, Lisa: “There’s no other way. No, don’t cry.” They kiss each other’s hands to cement the transition. His tears don’t smell now. Or, perhaps, she’s grown to like that smell as it affirms who she is.

1:32:36 – “I don’t know how I was ever afraid of you.” We spend our lives terrified of what’s inside, of who we truly are, because society teaches us to do exactly that.

But they, we, were never anything to be afraid of.

They’re about to kiss when police sirens interrupt them. Society’s policing of gender roles is still coming for them.

1:33:17 – Sitting on the edge of the tanning bed (which again, looks like a coffin), she hands Frank a note and uses her thumb to move a kiss from her lips to his, his face awash in trans lighting. For our true selves to live, our old selves must die. I SAW THE TV GLOW also uses this metaphor to great affect in its allegory.

1:33:35 – As Lisa lies down inside, ready to fully become her true self, the final kiss of self-acceptance.

1:33:47 – She’s bathed in the dysphoria light. It, too, will die with our old selves, as we live authentic lives hopefully free of the dysphoria that plagued us.

1:34:13 – Lisa’s not afraid now. This is what she’s been waiting for, and what she needs to do.

1:34:19 – The sparks from the final transformation knock over a pillar with one of Taffy’s tiara’s on it. A pillar of femininity is falling.

1:34:27 – The tanning bed erupts in flames, the past is destroyed. Frank’s still a little sad and emotional about it.

1:34:38 – Frank opens Lisa’s note. “Death is temporary. I’ll love you forever.” She did not sign her name, for “Lisa” is no more. There is only a lightning bolt, a symbol..

…of the thing that allowed her to become him.

1:35:15 – The shed goes up in flames. A kid looking on: “Bitchin’.” Yeah kid, transition is bitchin’!

Worth noting that I SAW THE TV GLOW also uses flames, and even emergency vehicles showing up at a house, in the same way. We “burn down” falsehoods and society treats it as an emergency and a crime.

1:35:24 – Taffy and their dad visit Lisa’s grave. She’s dead to them. I SAW THE TV GLOW and THE MATRIX (specifically the Animatrix short “Kid’s Story”) also use this metaphor for how many cis people see us when we transition… we’re dead to them.

1:35:43 – And yet, Taffy’s and Dad’s flowers are explicitly pink, white, and blue. As if, in death, perhaps, they could finally acknowledge Lisa’s truth. Maybe. But Taffy wear’s Lisa’s mom’s rosary, so she’s still chained under all those false beliefs.

And if you watch, Lisa’s dad doesn’t even leave the flowers he brought for Lisa. He takes them with him! Ugh c’mon man.

1:36:45 – But look at the flowers Frank left for her. They are, in fact, the very same flowers Lisa brought to Frank’s grave in Bachelor’s Grove back at 6:30 into the movie!

Frank was “dead” and had no way to know what she would have left him… unless he and Lisa were always the same person at two ends of transition.

Also, uh… didja catch what it says down on the bottom of Lisa’s tombstone? Beloved wife.

Transition: achieved. Self: Actualized.

1:36:51 – Frank is now on the bench, reading aloud. He has a voice. Finally!

He reads the poem “To Mary,” by Percy Shelley, who was… well, he was a lot, but he was married to Mary Shelley, who wrote the original Frankenstein (possibly as an excuse to get away from him for a while).

O Mary dear,
that you were here.
With your brown eyes
bright and clear.
And your sweet voice,
like a bird
Singing love to its lone mate
In the ivory bower disconsolate;
Voice the sweetest ever heard!
And your brow more than the sky
of this azure Italy.
Mary dear, come to me soon,
I am not well whilst thou art far;
As sunset to the sphered moon,
As twilight to the western star,
Thou, beloved, art to me.
O Mary dear,
that you were here;
The Castle echo whispers ‘Here’

Very much a longing for the one we love, the one we wish was here. And if you again view people in a romance as a person loving their true self enough to transition, it’s also perhaps a final goodbye. To the person we were, to the costume we wore, to the part we played. None of them our truth, but they persevered long enough, until we could be free. And real.

1:37:20 – Lisa is all in red, now she’s nothing but love. And she’s all bandaged, like a mummy (the poster in her bedroom/subconscious), like the papoose blankets she wrapped herself in, here at Papoose Lake. Even her brooch is a heart.

Notice again that the hat (which Frank gave her) has a flower on it, and she accepted it. Remember the opening credit animation, and how that indicated the perceived woman accepting the gift of Frank’s existence, but it disappeared when she rejected him? Well… here it is again. For good.

And her face is all white, going through the reversal of what we saw Frank go through. This is her end, and why Frank is saying goodbye.

And just look at his rainbow suspenders, he’s out and proud.

As we close out, I Call You Mine by The Zombies plays. Here’s some lyrics one. More. Time!

Though you and I would dance and laugh and play
Walk in the light of day and talk the night away
Could you see, baby, you understood then
That I loved you, how I loved you?

I couldn′t chance to break the spell we had
The happy times we had and yet the times were sad
Just for me, baby, you understood then
I was afraid to try to call you mine

But now, you’ve come to me (I′ll call you mine)
You’ve brought your love to me (I’ll call you mine)

Welcome, new real me. I’m here to stay.

And farewell, old me. You were never really me, but thanks for holding on long enough, and loving yourself enough, to get me here.

So! What’s your verdict? Was the incredibly deep transness in this film unintentionally intentional? Was it intentionally intentional? I think I’m leaning more toward the latter, but it’s up for debate!

But what’s not up for debate is that this is the most explicitly transmasc allegory I’ve ever seen, in a film that’s not only fun and a delight to watch, but that has so much to say about the ways society forces conformity on us all, and the damage that does to us.

Maybe at some point you got close to figuring yourself out, but then got scared, or hurt, and put the real you back in a box and buried them deep in your heart.

But Zelda Williams, Diablo Cody, Kathryn Newton, and Cole Sprouse are here to remind you that you can always let them back out. And you should.

It might just feel electric, and it might just make you whole, and a more real person than you’ve ever been.

Thank you for joining me on this installment of Tillyvision, and for accompanying me on the choppy seas as we ring the bells to keep the monsters away.

Transition saves us, babes.

And you’re worth saving.

Tilly Bridges, end transmission.
tillysbridges@gmail.com

THE UNINTENTIONALLY INTENTIONAL TRANS ALLEGORY OF LISA FRANKENSTEIN, part 7

Welcome to Trans Tuesday! Tillyvision batteries at maximum for THE UNINTENTIONALLY INTENTIONAL TRANS ALLEGORY OF LISA FRANKENSTEIN, part 7! This week transition goes further than ever, which causes those we love to reveal their true nature!

C’mon, just read PART 1, PART 2, PART 3, PART 4, PART 5, and PART 6 first so that you actually understand what I’m saying, okay? Do it for me.

Ok thx. Moving on!

54:51 – Lisa stitches the hand onto Frank. Here in her heart, she rejected the guy who assaulted her. Remember her confusion after it happened, in the “boys will be boys” world we lived in, as a trans man, when she wondered… if she didn’t want to assault women, was she really a man? Could she really be one? Is that really what “men are?”

No. You can be a man and respect women, actually, and here she’s finally rejected the kind of man Doug was. And it brings another piece of the real her to life.

55:27 – Frank goes for another dose of HRT energy in the tanning bed, and Lisa increases the dose to Ultra High. We’re moving up!

55:52 – Frank sits up from the tanning bed, more human than ever before!

And look, this is just my opinion, but his artful shaggy hair, the sideburns, the comfy casual clothes… Frank looks extremely transmasc-coded to me.

56:14 – They embrace, they dance in celebration. Lisa’s starting to really except her inner man.

57:03 – Frank immediately takes to the piano, to express himself. He’s great, and Lisa’s impressed.

57:55 – Lisa: “You had a whole life.” Frank points at her. “Yeah, I guess, yeah, I do. I guess so.” She does now!

58:10 – Frank wants her to play the piano with him, two as one. She says no, the piano is her dad’s, he hasn’t played since her mom died. Her only access to masculinity hasn’t expressed itself since her mom’s terrible reaction to Lisa being trans.

58:22 – She sits next to him, but doesn’t want to play. Clasps her arms behind her back. As they play, look how similar their hair is to each other as they sit side by side. Almost the same silhouette, but reversed. And we were introduced to Frank in the opening credit animation as a silhouette.

Huh.

58:40 – She sings, expressing herself as he expresses himself. They are as one. This is REO Speedwagon’s I Can’t Fight this Feeling.

I’ve been keeping a list, a long list, of popular songs that have really strong trans readings. There will be an essay featuring them someday, and let me tell you this song has been on my list for years.

It one hundo percento reads like a trans person truly accepting themselves.

I can’t fight this feeling any longer
And yet I’m still afraid to let it float
What started out as friendship
Has grown stronger
I only wish I had the strength to let it show

And even as I wander
I’m keeping you in sight
You’re a candle in the window
On a cold dark winter’s night
I’m getting closer
Than I ever thought I might

And I can’t fight this feeling anymore
I’ve forgotten what I started fighting for
And if, to bring this ship into the shore
Come crashing through your door
Baby I can’t fight this feeling anymore

This is Lisa’s transition self-acceptance song!

1:00:04 – Frank sniffles. Yeah! It’s so emotional to finally accept yourself! And live life as your true self. Though, again, the new smell catches her off guard.

1:00:39 – Lisa, to Frank: “You saved me.” Yeah, our true selves do save us. We are the one we’ve been waiting for (THE MATRIX is alllll about this).

1:01:10 – Lisa: “I gotta go change my pad,” Yeah, trans guys may have to do that, “and you gotta get upstairs for the night ‘cause they’re gonna be home soon.” This has been great, but I can only do this when I’m home alone, I can’t come out to my family or let them catch me.

1:01:31 – Look how miserable Lisa is having to hide her true self around her family. But she’s still in black. Though she’s still hiding her true self from them, she’s no longer hiding him from herself.

1:02:43 – Lisa makes a bad excuse to go up to her room (especially because Taffy is going to try and call their mom), and her dad notices her fingernails, there’s blood around them. What have you been doing? She’s suddenly worried she’s been caught.

It’s like when you experiment with gender when you’re alone and try to remove all signs before anyone sees, and maybe you missed a spot (we see this in I SAW THE TV GLOW (and Owen being ashamed of it, trying to wipe and scrape the evidence off of him).

But he’s not even worried she might have hurt herself, he’s agog that she used white out and not a pretty nail polish like she’d been taught. Nails should be polished and pretty and feminine! Never concerned with her well-being, only her appearance.

1:03:20 – Lisa goes into the closet, where Frank is playing with dolls. She laughs. Lisa: “That’s ‘Starlight Rosebud Hella Good Girl Gonna Need a Big Bank.’ But I just call her ‘Nibblets Corn.’ I don’t play with dolls anymore.” Is that… a name a girl who liked playing with dolls might name their doll? And the disdain when she said “I don’t play with dolls anymore”… is that because she’s too old?

Or because she wasn’t into “girly” things like that?

1:04:07 – Taffy calls Lisa from the hall, and Lisa freaks out and quickly closes the closet. Almost caught exploring your true gender again. Terrifying.

1:04:16 – When Taffy says she called her mom’s hotel and she never checked in, Frank thumps the closet door. With overly restrictive, transphobic, forced feminine gender conformity gone, the real us is anxious to finally get out of the closet for good.

1:04:21 – When Taffy’s talking about trying to find Janet in a Milwaukee hotel, note that she mentions Janet had multiple different last names. Forced compulsory cisgender heterosexuality says it’s fine for cis women getting married to change their names, but they balk at trans people doing it.

Remember Janet was a complete hypocrite, so this tracks. Name changes for me but not for thee. Gender affirming healthcare for me and not for thee. Once again, please see CIS PEOPLE GET GENDER AFFIRMING HEALTHCARE TOO, and TRANS KIDS 1: FACTS AND DANGERS (which will show you the very people legislating against surgeries trans kids aren’t getting make carve-outs in the laws to be sure they can force surgeries on intersex infants to make them conform).

1:06:00 – Frank, in a nightgown, uses the magic wand on Lisa’s shoulders. But Lisa is in collared pajamas with pants. With cowboys on it. Distinctively dudes. They have swapped.

1:06:32 – Lisa: “Do you feel anything in your body?” Will being a man make me feel like my body is mine, and that I’m whole? Frank grunts and nods. Lisa: “It must be kind of uncomfortable sleeping in the closet.” Let him out, let him feel.

1:07:21 – Look at them side by side in bed, in the same position, the trans lamp on the bedside table. Here, together in the subconscious, they face transness head-on.

1:08:40 – There’s an electric zap and the lights flicker due to the magic wand, and Lisa cries out “Oh my god!” We know what zaps mean. Life! Transition progress! Sometimes that includes learning how your body responds differently to certain stimuli after beginning HRT.

1:09:23 – Lisa: “After my mom died, everyone was in such a hurry to go back to normal. And they kept acting like I had a problem because I couldn’t stop missing her. Started to feel like I was going crazy. I thought that was gonna last forever but it didn’t, you know? And pretty soon everybody seemed like they were almost excited to move on and forget about her.”

Lisa’s mom’s betrayal wounded her, but everyone else just wanted Lisa to “go back to normal” and act like nothing happened.

1:09:48 – Here we see them drink at the same time, because they’re the same person. Lisa: “They kept saying, ‘time heals all wounds.’ But that’s a lie. Time is the wound. Takes you further and further from that place when you were happy. Makes those good smells go away. People are so afraid of death… ‘cause they don’t know when it’s gonna happen to them. It could be an axe murderer, it could be the flu, but they don’t know and they hate that, so… I’m not afraid of death anymore.”

She’s no longer afraid of transition, even though it is literally making her good smell change.

1:10:46 – They drink at the same time again. Lisa: “But I don’t want to die a virgin.” She wants to experience life, but for real this time. As her true self.

1:11:20 – Lisa asks Frank if he ever had sex, and Frank drinks while she clears her throat. Can’t respond when you’re drinking, y’know! Might make you choke a little.

Frank admits he had sex one time, with a woman he loved. Lisa: “I want that. I want to do it with someone I truly love. Like Michael Trent.” She wants to fully experience life as a gender nonconforming man. Frank grunts in annoyance, because he’s there already, but she still doesn’t feel like she is.

1:11:55 – Lisa says she’s going to “offer her body” to Michael. She’s going to try to make her body like his.

1:12:29 – Lisa’s now in the most black she’s ever been in. Transition is rolling right along. Taffy literally says it’s her costume. Nobody would really dress like that, Lisa.

Taffy’s upset about not knowing what happened to Janet and they switch seats, Lisa’s going to drive. Finally.

1:14:40 – Everyone at school knows Doug’s missing. Taffy’s too upset and says she’s going home, asks her friends if any of them can bring Lisa home after school, nobody wants to.

1:15:30 – Michael isn’t in class, he’s missing.

1:15:40 – Lisa gets called to the principal’s office. A girl student says, “Dress code violation.” Why are you dressing so weird Lisa? Don’t you know how to conform like a good girl? Girls don’t dress the way you do.

A boy student says, “Slut penalty.” You’re too weird for the conformos, you’d have to be a sexual deviant to dress that way!

1:17:31 – Tamara: “She’s off her rocker. She needs help. You know there’s a rumor that she killed her own mother.” There it is. She’s trans, ew. Punish her.

1:17:38 – As Frank walks, an old man disparages a young boy (in a dysphoria shirt!) trying to start a lawn mower. “Pull harder. What are you, a little fruitcake, huh?” Gender conformity comes for you when you’re perceived as a boy, even if you’re not, and even if you are!

1:18:02 – Frank takes a dysphoria club off the steering wheel of Janet’s car, which is yellow (she literally let her fear drive her).

It was locked by dysphoria, but now Frank is gonna drive. The horrible old man objects to Frank’s appearance. “This is my neighborhood. And you don’t need to be here. So carry your ass on out, or me and you gonna go after it right here.” Get out of here you fucking tranny, or it’s violence.

1:18:20 – Frank drives off after we see he laid the old bigot out (and took his clothes?!). The kid in the dysphoria tee waves and smiles happily as he goes. Protect trans kids, babes. And yourself.

1:19:17 – Lisa: “Shit is transpiring, man. You have to take me to Michael’s.” She wants her inner dude to take her to the non-toxic man she wants to be, still not fully comprehending all the red flags she’s seen along the way.

1:19:25 – Look at them sitting next to each other, both looking kind of formal, pseudo-Victorian in dress. They’re approaching the moment of self-actualization, when the inner man truly and finally comes out.

1:19:50 – Frank stops in front of a house with a ton of plastic pink flamingos in the yard. They kind of form a line. Lisa knows the “order” of conformity that she’s been taught, and this is her last gasp at fighting her truth. I’m just a girl who wants to bang a guy and nothing more.

1:20:00 – Frank doesn’t want her to have sex with Michael. You might be attracted to him, but mostly you want to be him, and that guy is right there in front of/inside of you, Lisa. Let him out.

1:20:14 – Lisa: “It’s your fault we’re screwed. You killed Janet, it wasn’t my idea.” We’re in this mess because I have a man inside me and not a woman, and you made me reject stereotypical femininity and the expectations that come with it.

“Okay, going after Doug was my idea, but only because killing Janed felt really good and I was just an accomplice.” You made me want to be the man I am and then I had to reject being the sexist creep that society says is just “boys being boys” because that’s not who I am.

Lisa: “But now you’re out of control. You’re beating people up, driving around in plain sight.” You’re making me see and reject all the lies of society, and you’re out where people can see you aka me! What will people think?!

1:21:20 – Lisa: “You act like you’re happy for me, and you care about me, but you’re not really happy for me.” “Stay in the car. Don’t let anyone see you.” Let the fear box you in, and hide your truth. Don’t let anyone see.

1:21:43 – The house is red. Danger. Taffy’s car is there. Red. Danger.

1:22:07 – The walls and the curtains are all yellow. She’s afraid of what she’s going to find, because she has picked up on the warning signs, even if not consciously.

1:22:22 – Lisa sees Taffy in bed with Michael, blue walls and blanket. Michael isn’t really different from other guys after all, and the despair of that (and of Taffy’s betrayal) is a lot.

As they’re about to kiss, she breaks in with a scream.

Remember at this point Taffy’s said she wasn’t into Michael twice, but those were lies. Michael gave her that hickey. And in fact, he even says he became infatuated with Taffy ever since the party… the party back at the beginning of the film when Taffy was supposedly going to confront him and Tamara about spiking Lisa’s dysphoria drink!

Taffy was going to defend Lisa, but instead just took the guy she was interested in. Just like when she outed Lisa to the other girls at the party, Taffy’s allyship has been PERFORMATIVE ALLYSHIP and FALSE ALLYSHIP all along. She was never truly on Lisa’s side, Taffy just wanted to feel like she was, so she could think of herself as a good person.

1:23:10 – Michael calls her “kiddo!” Infantilizing her just like her mom did, just like Doug (say it with me, I fuckin’ hate Doug) did. Michael is, in fact, no different from the rest of them.

He says he doesn’t have feelings for Lisa like he does for Taffy. Lisa: “Why? Because I’m not sweet, and simple, like her?” Because I’m not conforming to what society told me to? “Not enough polarity for you, Werner Heisenberg?” She’s name-dropping theoretical physicists now. As with silent film director Pabst, Lisa demonstrates she’s actually smart and knows a lot.

“You want to be the smart one who likes cool stuff, and you don’t want your girlfriend to like cool stuff. Do you know how uncool that is?” Why’s he gotta not be the kind of man she thought he was? The kind she wishes she was (and already really is)?

1:23:45 – Frank comes in to stand up for her, pulls the blanket off of Michael. Look at the blanket colors, there’s pink and blue together. Something trans is going on here.

On the Wings of Love by Jeffrey Osborn plays. Time for some lyrics!

Like a stream running free,
traveling on the wings of love.
On the wings of love
Up and above the clouds
the only way to fly
is on the wings of love
on the wings of love
only the two of us
together flying high

If we again interpret flight as GENDER EUPHORIA and love as the love of self it takes to transition in spite of all society throws at you, here’s the “I’ve found myself and gender euphoria” moment.

And given what’s occurring when it plays…

1:24:16 – This is about Michael’s “manhood,” ie Lisa realizing she didn’t want him, she wanted to be him (or rather, who she imagined he was).

1:24:19 – Lisa is… not horrified to realize what’s going on. She’s… surprised. And excited.

1:24:44 – Taffy screams and is horrified by Lisa’s revelation. Lisa still stops Frank from hurting her. Lisa never wanted to hurt anyone, even when those same people don’t and won’t accept her for who she is.

Remember this kill represents Lisa rejecting what she doesn’t want to be, which makes this one extra monumental (and is why it comes last). For the entire movie she’s been wanting to be Michael, but in learning the truth, that even he was putting on a bit of an act and wasn’t who she thought he was, she’s rejecting that too.

She doesn’t want to be any kind of man that’s dishonest or uses women, she wants to be a sensitive, creative, gender-nonconforming guy. And so she shall.

And as a reminder, we don’t transition to hurt cis people, we transition to relieve our own hurt. If they’re going to make it all about them and act like we lied to them, even though it was them and all of society who lied to us our entire lives, perpetuating SOCIETAL GASLIGHTING, that’s on them.

It’s not on us.

Next week we bring it all home and see if Lisa finally becomes the Frank she is. You might even say… we wrap it all up.

Tilly Bridges, end transmission.
tillysbridges@gmail.com

Part 8 is here!

THE UNINTENTIONALLY INTENTIONAL TRANS ALLEGORY OF LISA FRANKENSTEIN, part 6

Welcome to Trans Tuesday! Tillyvision’s gonna getcha in THE UNINTENTIONALLY INTENTIONAL TRANS ALLEGORY OF LISA FRANKENSTEIN, part 6! Finally, transition begins… and it brings with it a whole new set of problems to deal with!

Heed me now or forever be doomed: ye need PART 1, PART 2, PART 3, PART 4, and even PART 5 before ye be divin’ into this part 6, aye? Avast!

37:07 – She put the guy back into the closet, but the next day… he’s still there. Closeting yourself doesn’t make the truth go away, actually!

Lisa wants to get dressed, and closeted Frank tries to hand her a black dress of Taffy’s. Hey Lisa, transition, I’m right here.

Lisa: “It’s not really my style.” Frank tosses her a hat and the lacy black dress. The hat has a flower on it. Remember Frank giving a flower to a lady in the opening credits animation, and what it stood for? Hmmmmm…

37:45 – Lisa heads to school in the clothes Frank picked for her, and she looks great and it’s very gothy, right? And gothic things are emblematic of death, like we’ve talked about a few times already. Death is synonymous with change. The end of one thing so that something new can begin. She’s never dressed like this before, something. Has. Changed.

She’s the furthest into transition that she’s ever been. And look how suddenly the entire world around her is filled with danger. This is exactly what cis society is like for trans people, especially when we first come out and experience the world as our true selves.

Also the school mascot is the opossum. What are they most well known for? Playing dead. This is society mocking Lisa, mocking trans people, for existing in public as our true selves.

You’re just playing, you’re pretending to be a man, Lisa. We all know you’re “really” a woman.

It’s genius in the film, fucking awful in the real world.

And remember, again, that this school is in Brookview. You’ll never escape the water, and you’ll be surrounded by danger. Congrats on your transition, Lisa!

Everyone stares at her, she seems a bit embarrassed but then tries to own It. Cis people absolutely do this when they can’t instantly decide what gender they think you are, by the way. See STOP STARING AT US (trans people are human beings).

And so she’s uncomfortable, everything’s weird and different, and let’s look at some of those lyrics to “Lips Like Sugar” by Echo and the Bunnymen, which is playing during this segment.

She’ll be my mirror
Reflect what I am
Loser and winner
The king of Siam

And my Siamese twin
Alone in the river
Mirror kisses
Mirror kisses

It’s unfortunate that an offensive term like “Siamese twin” is in the lyrics (the 80s were a mess), but that really does read like dealing with another version of yourself that you’re trying to accept, huh? Huh.

38:11 – The audiobook Janet’s listening to is actually calling her out on everything she’s not, but what she thinks she is. Transphobes don’t hate trans people, they just want us to conform for our own good, you know! Uh huh.

Frank comes down the stairs. He won’t remain closeted.

38:30 – Look at the sheet Janet lifts up. Look at her leotard! Do you, uh, do you see those colors? It matches the walls of house, it’s all dysphoria and gender conformity. This isn’t a welcoming place for Frank.

39:00 – Frank spots the piano and heads for it. Creativity. Create. Self-expression. Make me real. Let me feel.

40:05 – What does Lisa’s true self, her inner man, think of Janet the literal dysphoria mommy? We’re gonna drop a worm in her food.

40:27 – Confirming what I just said about Janet’s audiobook, it says “You will instinctively know when something is off,” as she mixes her cottage cheese without noticing the new… addition. Until it’s in her mouth, and she pulls it out in disgust.

40:49 – The red lockers, the dysphoria, gender conformity, and despair flyers, and the dysphoria backpack. Just starting transition doesn’t make it all go away.

41:00 – Michael drops by to say he cut class, and wants to know if Lisa has any notes. She tries to play it cool like she was also planning to cut class, but has some notes. But her notes are super extensive. She’s not conforming to what other people at the school do, and she’s performing the femininity they expect to see.

This exact metaphor was used in REAL GENIUS, which is also an intentional trans allegory, to show a trans person not conforming to the cheating that society expects of us!

Also look at how Michael’s clothes have changed, and he’s now all dysphoria and danger. Now that Lisa’s dipped her toe into being her true self, something in her is setting off alarm bells about the guy she thought she wanted to be like.

41:15 – The same girl in red passes by… twice. I did not put those screenshots out of order to make it look like she walked by twice, she literally walks between them and the camera twice.

Is this an accident because there were a lot of extras and nobody noticed? Maybe. But it was a choice to use shots that make it appear that she passes by twice when editing. Maybe, juuuuust maybe, it’s Lisa picking up on the heightened danger around her.

41:23 – Michael: “You’re kind of absurd, aren’t you?” This is what the cis think of our false gender performance. Stop playing possum.

41:40 – When Taffy tries to get rid of Michael, “no punks, trenchies, or death clowns,” he replies: “Oscar Wilde said, ‘To definite is to limit.’” Hypocritical cis people drive me bananas. This is something you see in the intentional trans allegory of I SAW THE TV GLOW, and is a real world thing that happens.

We absorb all these aphorisms from society about how we should “be ourselves” and “break out of the box” and “you can be anything you want to be,” until you say “okay, I’m trans!” and then society has a collective shit-fit.

My wife and I actually wrote a very intentional trans allegory about this very phenomena in the Witching Season comic anthology.

42:08/42:17 – The same woman in a green-blue dysphoria outfit is seen over Taffy’s shoulder. First when Taffy asks if Lisa will cover for her when she goes out after cheerleading practice, and then when Taffy talks about how overprotective their dad is, and she lists his controlling behavior of wanting to know where she’s going and when she’ll be back.

Is this, again, because there were too many extras to track? Or do you think, even if the same extra they intentionally clothed in the color that’s their metaphor for gender dysphoria, walked by in two different shots that didn’t line up with how she was walking, they kept it in for a reason?

Could be accident! Could be intentional.

Either way, they chose to keep those shots in the final cut of the movie.

42:49 – Frank wants his body modifications to feel whole, and look at what his hand stump has been covered with? Dysphoria. The missing part of his body is causing dysphoria. And between them, a poster for The Creature from the Black Lagoon. The Frank she wants to be, born out of transitioning from dysphoria.

42:57 – Lisa: “I can’t just get you new parts. I mean… you’re a dead man, not a Chrysler LeBaron.” The man inside is dead and not complete with the body he has. Lisa: “I want to help you, but I don’t know how.”

Janet comes home and Frank runs for the closet. Lisa: “Damn it! Janet!” That’s a quote from and reference to The Rocky Horror Picture Show, which is famously gender-bendy.

Frank barely makes it back in the closet before Janet comes in, dressed in a nurse’s uniform, somewhat reminiscent of Nurse Rached from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, a symbol of everything gone wrong with people who abuse their power and corrupt bureaucracies. A pointed reference.

Lisa says she thought Janet was in Milwaukee. Basically, “I thought it was safe to let out my inner man and explore who he is because you were gone and I was alone.”

Janet blames Lisa for the worm in her food. Technically her fault, yes… but not dangerous? An inconvenience that you find gross. Like Agent Smith hating the smell of humans in THE MATRIX and Hathaway hating the smell of popcorn in REAL GENIUS, the way we inconvenience cis people is more important to them than us living authentic lives free of pain.

44:15 – While comparing herself to a literal angel, note that Janet suddenly uses two gendered insults for Lisa, “whore” and “bitch.” There’s nothing wrong with sex workers doing the job by choice, let’s be sex-positive here. But that doesn’t change the way the word and even the association is weaponized against all women… and perceived women. Akin to the way transphobic society often treats trans men as “confused lesbians,” just women who don’t know what they’re doing.

The gendering here is important. Janet’s saying you are a girl, Lisa. One who I will subjugate and oppress. Don’t forget it.

44:30 – Lisa: “I didn’t want to go to a new school my senior year. I didn’t want to leave the town that I lived in my whole life.” But she had to, because her mom reacted so badly to Lisa’s truth. Maybe the whole town did, too. Trans people often have to flee to places that are safer for us (see TRANS KIDS 2: THE INTAKE EXAM AND TRANS FLIGHT). And in the past we were even forced to hide ourselves even after receiving transition care. See TRANSMEDICALISM (and WPATH version 1).

Janet: “You were lucky to get out of there.” Meaning… what? Lisa might’ve been killed for who she was? “I’m sure people were talking.” Oh, Janet’s heard the rumors, it’s why she’s using gendered insults here. “Or maybe you liked being a hot topic.” You’re just doing it for the attention, nobody is really trans. “Maybe it was the first time anyone ever looked at you.” People saw you and hated you, Lisa.

Lisa tells her to shut up, and Janet slaps her. Physical violence for trans people not conforming. A sad reality for many of us. Janet then tells Lisa she’s being admitted to “Serenity Manor,” a name listed as the definition of “irony” in the dictionary.

Mental institutions for trans people, here we are. Again. Janet: “Where a disturbed person like you belongs!”

And then Frank knocks her. The fuck. Out. Her inner dude is not putting up with that.

Except this is a horror movie, so she’s actually dead. And remember that every kill in this movie is a rejection of the type of person Lisa/Frank doesn’t want to be.

This woman, and in fact, all of the ultra-femininity that she represents, have been rejected for good.

45:27 – Look at the sewing machine. A tool usually associated with “women’s work,” covered in gender conformity, dysphoria, and danger. And used to get rid of Janet? Frank drops it. We’re going to reject those things, too.

46:20 – Janet’s got red shoes, is wrapped in a red blanket, in a red wagon, and is dumped into a grave. We’re removing ourselves from that danger, burying it, and it allows us to move closer to our true selves and makes us more whole (as you’ll see in a second).

46:50 – Lisa: “Is it peaceful down there?” Frank shakes his head no. Lisa smiles. Why should our literal tormentors, who abuse us, be allowed more peace than they allow us? Why is it fine for JKR (see TERFS) to be allowed to use her billions to strip our rights away, but the second we say that’s bigoted and awful of her, we are made into the villains? Calling her a transphobe is so much worse than her actual transphobia to soooo many cis people.

And that ain’t right.

47:05 – Lisa sews the ear onto Frank, and look how the light has changed. There’s still danger, but the “eye” windows have turned blue. Which we know is metaphor for despair, but when next to the pink walls, it takes on a new meaning. Transness.

Frank’s new ear has Janet’s earring in it. You can be a gender nonconforming man, she tells herself. But it’s not functional. Lisa: “Maybe it could just be for looks?”

She can wear a packer if it makes her feel more whole, even if it doesn’t have any functionality. (a packer is a prosthetic penis and testicles trans mascs can situate in their undies to possibly lessen their gender dysphoria).

Lisa then relates it to her cousin Carlene who got a boob job (CIS PEOPLE GET GENDER AFFIRMING HEALTHCARE TOO). A breast enhancement is only about looks, fake boobies (which are totally fine if you want them, but no one should be made to feel like they need them) don’t serve any other function.

But hold up. Because “Carlene” derives from “Carl,” which derives from “Charles,” which means… “man.” The perceived man got a boob job, and their name is now the feminine version of “man,” so… “woman.” Sure sounds like Lisa has a cousin who’s a trans woman.

With a drawing of a lightning bolt, Frank tells her he needs electricity to make his body work better. Remember the electric zap the first time Lisa was in the HRT hut? And when the lightning struck and brought Frank to life? He’s asking for hormones!

48: 11 – Lisa takes him to the tanning shed, the path still one of danger, dysphoria, and gender conformity. But perhaps what hurt her before (trying to conform to being a woman) will help her now (trying to conform to being a man).

We already saw her mom’s earring on Frank’s new ear, so we know she’s going to be a gender nonconforming trans man to some degree. But parts of who she really is might also find that what society says men should be is what she wants, and that’s okay too (maybe like having a beard, or a deeper voice… things that gender affirming medical care can give you with HRT!)

Lisa’s wearing a tiara and holding a magic wand. How many trans people have said hormones are literally magic? So many of us.

Also if your body is too low on both estrogen and testosterone, did you know you will have less energy? You feel lethargic and tired all the time.

Even having the wrong hormone in your body can make you feel like shit, ask me how I know. But the right hormone will literally energize you.

48:25 – The tanning bed opens, dysphoria light everywhere. She “awakens” him by tapping him with the magic wand (which is extra funny considering what’s in her closet, the magic wand vibrator). And his new ear works!

49:08 – Lisa comes in, dressed in red and black. A change, a transition, that she loves (when she’s in red, remember, it means love and not danger).

There’s a “25” shadow on the wall behind Lisa, from light from outside coming through above the door, all of the address that can be seen.

Again, meanings vary in metaphor and numerology, but there seems to be a consensus around it meaning things like personal growth, inner wisdom, and major life changes.

HUH.

49:31 – Taffy: “You look deadly.” So transy, Lisa! WHAT HAVE I BEEN TELLING YOU.

“Don’t tell Mom I said this, but it’s actually kind of nice not having her in town.” Yeah, because gender conformity hurts cis people too, even the arch-feminine.

50:15 – Lisa: “What happened to your neck?” Taffy’s got a hickey, but makes excuses. Why is Lisa calling it out here? We already know since we’ve seen the movie, but remember Michael’s shirt from the last time Lisa talked to him? Danger! And dysphoria.

“Head On” by The Jesus and Mary Chain plays. Here’s some lyrics:

As soon as I get my head round you
I come around catching sparks off you
I get an electric change from you
That secondhand living, it just won’t do

And the way I feel tonight
Oh I could die and I wouldn’t mind
And there’s something going on inside

As transition songs go, regardless of the song’s original intent, this one’s screaming “full speed ahead.”

51:17 – Lisa’s leaves a lipstick kiss on a note. Who’s it for? Not who you think. It reads: “Hi… I’ve been thinking about you… a lot. Meet me at Papoose Lake at 4 pm? Yes or No, Love, Lisa S”

So, uh… what is a papoose? It comes from the Narragansett word “papoos,” which means “child.” Buuut it’s also come to be used for the baby carrier some Native Americans use, where the baby is swaddled up inside.

Remember when Lisa wrapped herself up in her bedsheets to look like that? Remember the poster for The Mummy on her bedroom wall? And now Papoose Lake?

This is foreshadowing everything. We’ll refer back to this at the end!

51:24 – Lisa does her nails with white out. If she’s going to conform to gendered expectations, she’ll do it in a way you didn’t think she would.

51:53 – Someone circled Yes on the note, he’ll meet with her. But who?

52:02 – Lisa’s on the bench, alone. The same one we saw Frank on, in the opening credits animation.

51:19 – It’s Doug! (I fucking hate Doug.) What the heck is he doing here?

52:40 – Doug says he’s never heard her talk this much. Lisa: “I suppose I never thought I had much to contribute, but I feel much more extroverted lately.” See CONFIDENCE and CONFIDENCE 2: INTO THE UNKNOWN aka WHAT IS HAPPENING aka A WHOLE NEW WORLD for a direct connection to how this changes with transition!

52:52 – She’s taken Doug to Bachelor’s Grove, the place where her true self was walled off from the world. Her heart. Why would she let this creep in there?

53:15 – Doug: “It’s not Christian for a graveyard to be left like this.” But it’s Christian to force unwanted sexual contact on someone, is it?

53:42 – Lisa: “I want you to touch me exactly the way you touched me at the party.” Doug: “Oh I knew you wanted it.” Barf.

53:54 – Frank pops up from under the leaves to take care of this problem. Lisa knees Doug in the face. (I fucking hate Doug. This is very satisfying.)

54:14 – Frank chops off Doug’s hand, Lisa raises it in triumph. Frank flings the axe and kills Doug. (Bye Doug, we fucking hated you, you won’t be missed.) Remember kills are metaphors for rejection! She will not, she will never, be this kinda dude.

Come back next week as transition progresses further than ever before, and sadly reveals a new level of betrayal from those we love.

Tilly Bridges, end transmission.
tillysbridges@gmail.com

PART 7 is here!

THE UNINTENTIONALLY INTENTIONAL TRANS ALLEGORY OF LISA FRANKENSTEIN, part 5

Welcome to Trans Tuesday! Tillyvision stops for no one (except for me, when we get to the end) in THE UNINTENTIONALLY INTENTIONAL TRANS ALLEGORY OF LISA FRANKENSTEIN, part 5! This week we’ll examine the hell we’ve been trapped in, and confront a part of ourselves we’d left for dead!

I don’t know how many times I’ve got to tell you, but you def need PART 1, PART 2, PART 3, and PART 4 first. If you start here at part 5, listen, I won’t be held responsible for your confusion.

Ready? Heck yeah! Go!

25:47 – Lisa climbs out onto the roof and we get our first look at the house she lives in, is trapped in. It’s gender conformity allll the way down, with only more gender conformity and dysphoria inside. Look at how the symbols just below both house peaks look like a uterus! They’re the highest points, for the woman at the top and the girls beneath her. Making babies is what women are for, and that includes you Lisa, because you’re a woman!

And the two oval windows, in places of prominence, that look like vulvas!

This house is nothing but conformity and dysphoria for a trans man. Again, trans dudes don’t need to have bottom dysphoria, but this is metaphor… and Lisa sure seems to have bottom dysphoria.

26:18 – She falls, and Frank is there to break her fall. Supertext? You better believe it.

And there they are, face to face. But he’s sure hard to see clearly, isn’t he? The neighbors hear Lisa screaming and think nothing of it because “[Lisa’s] very odd.” Not worth helping when you scream, not if you’re gonna be all trans about it. But they think Taffy’s “adorable. And what a figure!” (ew)

This is how society reinforces its gender norms and compulsory cisness, and we absorb that our whole lives and learn we’d better be good little cis folks or people will never help us. (How sad it is that we’re at a point where just not helping us feels like it’d be a step up from everyone always attacking us).

To learn more about the ways society programs these things into us, see IMPLICIT QUEERPHOBIA.

26:55 – Back in the house Lisa sprints past the mirror, and it once again splits and breaks her reflection. She picks up the red phone to call 911… but hears Frank on the phone? He’s grunting into her dad’s shoe-phone from the other room, where he sits on the floor. She’s going to call for help, and the man she is, or wants to be, is there for her. He’s the help she seeks.

“Strange” by Galaxie 500 plays again. We previously heard it in Lisa’s dream… her dream about becoming her true self. That it plays again here, when she finally meets him, is telling you lots. Are you listening?

Frank’s missing a hand. The man she truly is doesn’t have all the body parts you might expect a man to, or doesn’t look the way society tells you that men look. And she’s immediately no longer afraid of him.

27:35 – Look at the pink and blue under the stereo, right next to Frank. Transness!

Lisa mentions the shoe phone was a free gift with her dad’s subscription to Sports Illustrated, more conforming to gendered expectations. Does Lisa seem sporty to you? Like she wants to play sports? No. That is also not the kind of man she wants to be, but that’s what society says men have to be, and this shit really messes you up when you’re trying to figure things out.

No shade if you are a trans guy who likes sports, I like sports and I’m a trans woman! Like what you like! But also there are things society says we have to do and like to be men and women, and that’s bullshit. Did you notice that the golf club Lisa grabbed to defend herself had a green-blue dysphoria cover on it? Being a sports dude is not the kind of man she wants to be either.

Frank gives Lisa her lost slipper back. This guy you are inside and want to be? He can help you, Lisa.

28:26 – They talk about the music, she asks him if he likes the song (the song about how living a lie brings no joy!), she says she has The Cure and Frank is excited and holds out his hand-stump, and she meant the band, not the cure to gender dysphoria, but that music can cure him emotionally.

But she does have the cure to Frank being incomplete! Letting him out and transitioning can make you whole.

28:33 – She takes Frank to her room and says, “We’ve got to hide you.” Yeah we know what happens when you let your inner man out, your mom becomes dead to you and vice versa. “Definitely no one can see you.”

We only let our true selves out for minutes at a time at first, hidden behind closed doors.

When they enter her room, aka subconscious, in the background you can see a poster for The Mummy on the wall. Remember how she wrapped herself up in blankets when Frank was brought back to life?

This’ll come up again. It’s something that’s on Lisa’s mind.

Frank spots the rubbing from his gravestone, and points to it to let her know that’s him. It’s you Lisa, the true you. Back from the dead. It’s not too late. To confirm he pulls Lisa’s mom’s rosary out of a pocket. He kept it safe just like she asked.

Reconnecting with her inner man that she thought was dead brings back all those feelings, from her mother, that kept her trapped. Now she’s feeling all those things again.

29:28 – Lisa: “You? You’re him? Well, why are you here?” I didn’t ask for this, why is this happening to me? He lifts her hand to kiss it, and she pulls away, disgusted. Sadly society teaches us to be disgusted with ourselves, that our transness is something wrong, to be ashamed of, to hide behind closed doors. She’s not ready to fully accept. Oof that INTERNALIZED TRANSPHOBIA hits hard.

29:47 – Lisa: “When I said I wished I was with you, I meant I wished I was in the ground, dead. Life sucks and people are jerk-offs.” She wished her false girl shell was dead so she could be with the boy she’d been pretending was dead all her life, and now he’s here, alive.

Also, realistically, a lot of trans people feel so attacked by society and their own friends and family, and are left to suffer, that many can think death is their only way out. And that’s extra horrible and sad because happiness is attainable if we’re just supported.

Lisa clarifies she was only looking for that way out, and didn’t realize there was another way out of her pain and misery… through him. Frank is saddened by the news, he cries. He’s sensitive.

And the smell overwhelms her.

Now look, she was kinda into the smell of the guy she thought she wanted to be, Michael Trent. What would it be like to smell like that?

Here, her true man has a smell, and it revolts her. Remember that the tanning bed shed is our metaphor for HORMONE REPLACEMENT THERAPY.

One of the first things to happen for a lot of people who go on HRT is that our smell changes. Really early on in my medical transition, I just started smelling like a girl! For trans people on testosterone, it goes the other way.

I imagine everyone’s familiar with the smell of boy funk. It is, generally, somewhat less pleasant than girl smell. Some people undoubtedly like it! But Lisa was not prepared for her smell to change, and possibly “worsen” in her opinion. It’s also possible that suddenly smelling like a boy spiked some INTERNALIZED TRANSPHOBIA, so do read that if you haven’t yet.

30:37 – She takes him into the bathroom, he picks up a douche, and she’s like… no. He drops it. Many trans men would like to not have the body parts those are used on, I’m just saying.

Again again again, you don’t have to need or want bottom surgery to be trans, okay? Just clarifying. This is metaphor remember. You will find no TRANSMEDICALISM here.

30:43 – The mirror in the bathroom is fixed already, but through this scene you never see them in it. But here you can see Lisa’s looking at it… but she’s not looking at it straight on. She’s looking at an angle… she’s looking at Frank. Even though he doesn’t at all look like the man she recognizes or wants to be, she can see him in it!

30:56 – Lisa says she hasn’t talked this much in a long time (or in the entire movie so far), and couldn’t talk at all for a while, which all started after her mom’s “death.” She asks Frank if he’s going to talk, and he only… moans. He cannot talk. When did that happen to Lisa? After she talked to her mom about her gender feelings.

And here she is, encountering her inner man, and he cannot talk either.

31:16 – She turns on the shower radio for him, not Taffy’s station “for beer sluts” (lol), but she turns it to the college radio station (often indie, counterculture, unrestrained, nonconformist) and says “it’s for people like us. With feelings.”

”Like us”, Lisa? With feelings? What kind of feelings? This is a newly undead man you know nothing about! How could you know he had the same taste in music? Unless…

Yeah.

31:48 – “Up the Down Escalator” by The Chameleons plays as Frank showers, and over the next scenes. With a title like that you know it’s a song about not conforming to what society expects, not taking the easy way of doing things the way they want. Here’s a choice snippet of lyrics:

They sit at their tables and throw us the scraps
For Christ’s sake leave us something!
Now they can erase you at the flick of a switch
How long now will it take now?
There must be something wrong boys
There must be something wrong boys
They’re dragging me down
And they’re dragging me down
They’re dragging me down
You either swim or you drown

You either transition or you succumb to dysphoria. Yeah, there’s something wrong, boy.

32:09 – Cleaned up and closer to the real him, looking more alive, Frank wears a lady’s robe! Lisa opens her closet and dresses him in a bunch of her different clothes, because when you transition, at first all you have is all your old clothes from the gender you never were.

Lisa’s closet has the man on the moon with the rocket in his eye on it, from her dream. She keeps a poster of it in her room, as a reminder, an aspiration… like a vision board. But every time she puts Frank in the closet (supertext), the moon is split. And then forms a barrier keeping them apart.

She’s never going to get there by keeping him in the closet.

But she closes it, leaving him in there.

He opens it, in a White Sox baseball jersey. Which she just already happened to have? Pristine and new because she never wore it, because she’s not a sports guy.

He opens it again, and comes out in a kind of western cowboy shirt. It’s blue, as are his pants. He has cowboy boots on. All of which she just already happened to have?!

He opens it again in a red and blue collared shirt, jeans, and red shoes. All male-coded.

WHICH SHE JUST ALREADY HAPPENED TO HAVE??

He pops out in a pink satin robe, and Lisa says she loves it, but Frank doesn’t.

She’s tried a bunch of different guy clothes and none of them felt right, so she went back to gender conforming in a women’s pink robe, and her inner guy said no, that’s not right either.

He comes out in a pink and red getup, male-coded, that is also not right.

WHICH SHE AGAIN JUST ALREADY HAPPENED TO HAVE.

Then Lisa has an epiphany, and gives him a stack of clothes that include a Violent Femmes band t-shirt (what might society say about a perceived woman who refused to conform and said she wasn’t a woman at all?) under a men’s blazer…

WHICH SHE ALREADY JUST — look, you get it already, this whole bit… she had these clothes because she’d already been experimenting with dressing in guy clothes because they gave her gender feelings, possibly even left over from when she first realized and came out to her mom, which went disastrously.

These are the whole early stages of transition, trying out so many things that don’t work or aren’t right, backsliding, jumping forward, trying to find what feels like you. See FINDING OUR TRANS STYLE for more.

We don’t do it in one night, or in a montage set to music, but y’know, this is art and not real life.

32:37 – She’s brushing his hair in the bathroom, trying it different ways to see what looks best. Here, finally, we see them together in the mirror, looking at each other. He grunts toward his missing hand and she says “I can’t do anything about that. I’m not a doctor.”

Yeah, some of us do need medical transition. Lisa: “But it’s okay. They’re just things that make you different.”

So she’s telling herself, here, that the fact that she doesn’t have the body you might expect a man to have is okay, it just means she’s different. It doesn’t mean she’s not really a man. And if you think that’s a stretch… I beg you to please keep reading.

Lisa then goes on to explain there’s a character with an eyepatch on a soap opera that’s very cool and his eyepatch doesn’t define him. But his name is “Patch,” and she realizes our terrible society sadly does define us by our differences.

I’m always seen as trans before I’m seen as a woman or a wife or a mom or a writer or anything else. See NO ESCAPE (from reminders I’m trans) for more on that.

Also look how neither of them are really happy yet… just because you start transition doesn’t mean you instantly start seeing the real you in the mirror. It took me years of transition until it started happening regularly.

You can watch it happen for me in real time, in PHOTOS 2: THE SELFIE APOCALYPSE.

34:05 – Lisa’s parents come home and we hear them yelling from downstairs (about the broken glass and mess from Frank) and Lisa gasps and instantly tells Frank: “Get in my closet!” Well it was fun to experiment alone when nobody was here and now back into the closet we go so my parents don’t find out.

34:12 – Lisa comes down the stairs reassuring them that she’s fine, but they’re not at all concerned about her, only about, again, the way this has affected them (it’s CIS GRIEF again, all up and down).

Lisa makes a (hilarious) bad excuse to cover up what she was really doing. Janet: “Lisa got a lot of attention when the tragedy happened. So now she’s, well, recreating the scene of the crime.”

When Lisa’s mom “died” it’s when Lisa first revealed a piece of her truth. But clearly we “only do it for the attention” (so many Republicans think we actually do this, or that trans kids actually do this, because it’s “popular” or we just “want attention”).

And so here’s Janet… correctly piecing together that there’s a connection between Lisa revealing a piece of her truth when her mom “died” and what she’s been up to tonight.

I told you, I FUCKIN’ TOLD YOU!

Janet: “She has been ransacking our home, little by little. The cake stand, the bathroom last night, and now this.” Why won’t you damned transes see how this is affecting me, a cis person, and the only one who matters when you come out?!?

“She needs help. Residential treatment. She needs to go somewhere.” Get this trans out of my life and out of society, can’t you see what they’re doing to ME and MY HOME (never once showing an ounce of concern for the child she’s supposed to love and care for).

35:18 – Frank hears this, and he’s stumbled out of the closet. Lisa’s inner self has more CONFIDENCE than the false shell, and can’t stand the way they’re being treated.

35:43 – Lisa: “I’m not crazy.” No she’s not! Her dad: “Nobody said that.” Taffy: “My mom actually just did!” Dad: “No, she would never say that.”

That’s SOCIETAL GASLIGHTING in action, it’s real and it fucking sucks. Janet: “You’re either crazy, or you’re just goddamned inconsiderate.” Me me me, why won’t you think about how your trans nonsense affects me.

36:25 – Lisa retreats to her room, back to the despair box of bed, the gender conformity of the pink wall, the fear light framing the photo of her mother, the danger right in front of her. Phew.

Frank gently comes out of the closet, between the moon with the rocket in its eye. Lisa rolls away from him, tears in her eyes, rejecting the truth she was starting to find again, because cis people put their feelings over her needs and hurt her. Her family hurt her and it’s making her reject her truth. This happens to so many of us, sometimes even from those who supposedly love us the most. See CIS SPOUSAL AND PARTNER SUPPORT to learn more.

But this is the actual goal when cis people treat us this way, even if they don’t know it consciously. It’s to make it too painful for us to continue existing as our true selves, so we’ll reject our truth and we will suffer so cis people don’t have to be made “uncomfortable.”

Those who do that to us do not care about us. No one who would ask us to suffer for their convenience actually cares about us, no matter what they may say or think.

So Frank retreats back into the closet, and closes the door. And now even the idea of GENDER EUPHORIA, of flying up to that moon… is in that dysphoric green-blue, glowing in the dark. All she can see.

Come back next week to see transition begin! And how that opens you up to a whole new world, in ways both good and… dangerous.

Tilly Bridges, end transmission.
tillysbridges@gmail.com

PART 6 is here!